August: Day 28: Teaching 1:
Venerable Moses the Ethiopian
(The Judgment of God Punishing Murderers)
By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko
Venerable Moses the Ethiopian
(The Judgment of God Punishing Murderers)
By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko
I. The life of Venerable Moses, celebrated today, is very instructive. It demonstrates that there are no sins that can overcome the mercy of God. The great robber, who shed human blood and committed various wicked deeds, after his conversion to God, when divine grace touched his soul through his conscience, became a completely different person. Leaving behind the companions of his sinful life and all the treasures he had plundered, he secluded himself in a monastery, where, through the practices of fasting, prayer, humility, courageous and relentless struggle against his passions and desires, and constant tearful repentance, he attained a high degree of holiness. Regarding his former sinful life, let us today, brethren, discuss the sin of murder.
II. Murder is one of those heinous acts for which the divine judgment befalls the wrongdoer in this life, unless he sincerely repents with all the strength of his soul, often immediately after committing the crime, and even more frequently through remarkable and astonishing means. The heinous act of murder is so grave that the very blood of the slain cries out to God for cleansing of its own blood and the "souls of the slain" (Revelation 6:10); the blood innocently shed by him on the earth also cries out against him (Genesis 4:10); and even the very justice of God. The first murderer on earth, Cain, bore throughout his life the mark of God's rejection and the sign of heavenly judgment and punishment upon his forehead: "And the Lord said to Cain, 'The voice of your brother's blood cries out to Me from the ground. Now you are cursed from the earth, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you cultivate the ground, it shall no longer yield its strength to you; you shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth'" (Gen. 4:10–12). Therefore, Cain's burden of life was heavier and more terrifying for the villain than death itself, which he wished for (-14); yet death was also withheld from him by the threat of God's judgment, for it is said: "Whoever kills Cain will be avenged sevenfold" (-15).
A murderer, despite all efforts to conceal their heinous crime, sooner or later, one way or another, is inevitably exposed and incriminated, or else confesses to their transgression on their own accord due to the accusations of their conscience. How often do even the most trivial circumstances, the most fortuitous signs, provide grounds for even the least experienced judges to identify and reveal the concealed murderer. Yet sometimes God allows a murderer to temporarily evade lawful prosecution; even then, how strikingly and instructively does the righteous judgment of God unmask the killer!
a) More often than not, he is confronted by pangs and torments of conscience. Conscience is the voice of the sincere and incorruptible judgment of God within the human soul. Examples of such conscience acting in the denunciation of murder are numerous and diverse. One bandit, named David, became so accustomed to killing people that he shed human blood without any remorse, much like the blood of animals, and became the leader of a gang of similarly evil men. Once, by divine arrangement, during moments of solitary contemplation, his conscience suddenly awakened – and he abandoned everything to engage in the most rigorous repentance.
And here is another similar example. A robber named Barbaros instilled terror in all the nearby lands with his wicked deeds. One day, after a robbery and the shedding of human blood, burdened with treasures, he secluded himself in a cave to review the riches acquired through his latest murder. In the solitude of the cave, nothing entertained him; and then, gazing at the treasures, he asked himself in good conscience: "What is all this for?" In those moments, his conscience arose as a fearsome accuser of the robber, and the one whom no pursuit could catch, stood before a servant of God and said: "I am a robber! My heinous acts are countless: I have robbed, I have killed! If you know, my father, that God will accept my repentance, then bind me by any means, I am ready to fulfill anything. If not, then here is my sword, command it to slay me!"
b) Sometimes it happens that a murderer, fearing legal prosecution and trial, immediately after committing the crime strives solely to suppress the reproaches and torments of conscience, to conceal the traces of the murder, and to deflect suspicions away from himself; yet, in the confusion of conscience, his strange actions reveal more than they conceal, the traces of the murder and the signs of suspicion.
c) There are even instances when a troubled conscience can lead to a kind of madness, causing one who has innocently shed human blood to reveal himself as a murderer and to acknowledge the immediate judgment of God over him. Here is one such example recorded in history. Theoderic, king of the barbarian Ostrogoths, when he seized Italy, killed Pope John in prison based on slander and unfounded suspicion, contrary to the dictates of his conscience; he tortured the famous senator Boethius to death in horrific means and beheaded his father-in-law Symmachus. Although he had long grown accustomed to murder and bloodshed, he could not help but feel the pangs of conscience for the blood of the innocent that had been spilled. Nevertheless, he sought to silence his conscience and refused to confess or repent for his heinous acts. Meanwhile, the judgment of God had rendered its verdict, as the judgment of conscience took its course: Theoderic, overwhelmed by spiritual turmoil and inner conflict, fell into a dark and tormenting state of mind, and eventually became completely deranged. During dinner, the servants presented Theoderic with the head of a large fish on the table. He believed that it was the head of the recently slain Symmachus, and that it, having bitten down on its lower lip and gazing at him with eyes expressing ferocity and rage, was threatening him terribly... Terrified by this extraordinary vision and trembling as if in a fever, he rushed to his bed. He mourned his sin against Symmachus and Boethius, expressing his regret for this misfortune, and thereupon he passed away.
d) There are also such individuals who, after committing murder, manage to evade legal prosecution and subsequently continue to live peacefully. In such cases, God's judgment reveals the murderer through the unique circumstances of life and exacts vengeance for the innocent blood of humanity. Most often, this divine judgment manifests itself in a way that the fleeing murderer, by an inexplicable turn of events, finds himself among those suspected of committing another murder; the circumstances of the case become so convoluted that the perpetrator of the previous murder cannot prove his innocence regarding the current one. Consequently, he either acknowledges the visible judgment of God in his fate and reveals the truth or, in cases of concealment, receives punishment for a hidden crime for a murder in which he is actually not guilty. The Venerable Ephrem the Syrian provides several examples of such divine judgment upon various villains.
e) The judgment of God sometimes acts in the condemnation of a murderer through mute animals and even inanimate objects. In the Greek kingdom, during the reign of Emperor Constantine the Great, this incident occurred: a traveler was walking along a deserted road, accompanied by his pet dog. A robber attacked the traveler, killed him, and fled the scene. The animal, witnessing the murder, remained by its slain master's body without leaving his side. Another passerby buried the corpse, and the animal followed its benefactor and stayed with him. The new owner of the dog was the keeper of an inn. After some time, the hidden murderer entered the inn; the dog, who normally showed affection to all guests, suddenly, to everyone's astonishment, attacked the newcomer with barking and fiercely lunged at his face; it was commanded to stop; it did not obey and repeated its assault several times. Those who witnessed this suspected the stranger of harboring hostile intentions towards the former owner of the animal and reported this to the court. During the trial, the hiding villain confessed to the murder of a human.
Or here is another remarkable case. Two companions were walking together, when one resolved to take the life of the other in order to seize his treasure. The defenseless sufferer in the hands of the villain implored him to take the treasure, so long as he would not kill him, and earnestly promised to keep the villainous attempt a secret; yet the villain paid no heed to the sufferer's pleas. And so, when he was delivering the final fatal blow to his victim, the sound of the church bell reached them; the dying man called upon the all-seeing God to bear witness to this sacred sound against the murder and to testify against the murderer. With a wicked mockery of the dying man's helplessness and the futility of his hopes, the villain completed the act. And what of it? From that time onward, the murderer could not peacefully hear the sound of the church bell: every time he heard it, the villain was overtaken by confusion and trembling. Tormented by the consciousness of God's judgment upon him, the criminal realized the necessity of confessing to the murder and did confess.
The Roman emperors and persecutors of Christians in the early centuries struggled to devise means to amplify the torments and the shedding of Christian blood. For all this, they either experienced divine punishment in the form of horrific and unprecedented suffering from repulsive diseases, or they met their end by their own lives and blood, shed at the hands of murderers, bringing retribution for the tortures and violent death of Christians. "O tears, tears! O Christian blood! How cruelly you avenge yourselves!" lamented more than one persecutor of Christians, recognizing the punishing hand of God upon him. (See "Sunday Readings", 1857).
III. Brethren! Let us pray to the Lord that He may deliver us not only from such a grave sin as murder, but may He also preserve us from hatred of our neighbor, for according to the judgment of Christ, everyone who hates his brother is a murderer.
II. Murder is one of those heinous acts for which the divine judgment befalls the wrongdoer in this life, unless he sincerely repents with all the strength of his soul, often immediately after committing the crime, and even more frequently through remarkable and astonishing means. The heinous act of murder is so grave that the very blood of the slain cries out to God for cleansing of its own blood and the "souls of the slain" (Revelation 6:10); the blood innocently shed by him on the earth also cries out against him (Genesis 4:10); and even the very justice of God. The first murderer on earth, Cain, bore throughout his life the mark of God's rejection and the sign of heavenly judgment and punishment upon his forehead: "And the Lord said to Cain, 'The voice of your brother's blood cries out to Me from the ground. Now you are cursed from the earth, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you cultivate the ground, it shall no longer yield its strength to you; you shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth'" (Gen. 4:10–12). Therefore, Cain's burden of life was heavier and more terrifying for the villain than death itself, which he wished for (-14); yet death was also withheld from him by the threat of God's judgment, for it is said: "Whoever kills Cain will be avenged sevenfold" (-15).
A murderer, despite all efforts to conceal their heinous crime, sooner or later, one way or another, is inevitably exposed and incriminated, or else confesses to their transgression on their own accord due to the accusations of their conscience. How often do even the most trivial circumstances, the most fortuitous signs, provide grounds for even the least experienced judges to identify and reveal the concealed murderer. Yet sometimes God allows a murderer to temporarily evade lawful prosecution; even then, how strikingly and instructively does the righteous judgment of God unmask the killer!
a) More often than not, he is confronted by pangs and torments of conscience. Conscience is the voice of the sincere and incorruptible judgment of God within the human soul. Examples of such conscience acting in the denunciation of murder are numerous and diverse. One bandit, named David, became so accustomed to killing people that he shed human blood without any remorse, much like the blood of animals, and became the leader of a gang of similarly evil men. Once, by divine arrangement, during moments of solitary contemplation, his conscience suddenly awakened – and he abandoned everything to engage in the most rigorous repentance.
And here is another similar example. A robber named Barbaros instilled terror in all the nearby lands with his wicked deeds. One day, after a robbery and the shedding of human blood, burdened with treasures, he secluded himself in a cave to review the riches acquired through his latest murder. In the solitude of the cave, nothing entertained him; and then, gazing at the treasures, he asked himself in good conscience: "What is all this for?" In those moments, his conscience arose as a fearsome accuser of the robber, and the one whom no pursuit could catch, stood before a servant of God and said: "I am a robber! My heinous acts are countless: I have robbed, I have killed! If you know, my father, that God will accept my repentance, then bind me by any means, I am ready to fulfill anything. If not, then here is my sword, command it to slay me!"
b) Sometimes it happens that a murderer, fearing legal prosecution and trial, immediately after committing the crime strives solely to suppress the reproaches and torments of conscience, to conceal the traces of the murder, and to deflect suspicions away from himself; yet, in the confusion of conscience, his strange actions reveal more than they conceal, the traces of the murder and the signs of suspicion.
c) There are even instances when a troubled conscience can lead to a kind of madness, causing one who has innocently shed human blood to reveal himself as a murderer and to acknowledge the immediate judgment of God over him. Here is one such example recorded in history. Theoderic, king of the barbarian Ostrogoths, when he seized Italy, killed Pope John in prison based on slander and unfounded suspicion, contrary to the dictates of his conscience; he tortured the famous senator Boethius to death in horrific means and beheaded his father-in-law Symmachus. Although he had long grown accustomed to murder and bloodshed, he could not help but feel the pangs of conscience for the blood of the innocent that had been spilled. Nevertheless, he sought to silence his conscience and refused to confess or repent for his heinous acts. Meanwhile, the judgment of God had rendered its verdict, as the judgment of conscience took its course: Theoderic, overwhelmed by spiritual turmoil and inner conflict, fell into a dark and tormenting state of mind, and eventually became completely deranged. During dinner, the servants presented Theoderic with the head of a large fish on the table. He believed that it was the head of the recently slain Symmachus, and that it, having bitten down on its lower lip and gazing at him with eyes expressing ferocity and rage, was threatening him terribly... Terrified by this extraordinary vision and trembling as if in a fever, he rushed to his bed. He mourned his sin against Symmachus and Boethius, expressing his regret for this misfortune, and thereupon he passed away.
d) There are also such individuals who, after committing murder, manage to evade legal prosecution and subsequently continue to live peacefully. In such cases, God's judgment reveals the murderer through the unique circumstances of life and exacts vengeance for the innocent blood of humanity. Most often, this divine judgment manifests itself in a way that the fleeing murderer, by an inexplicable turn of events, finds himself among those suspected of committing another murder; the circumstances of the case become so convoluted that the perpetrator of the previous murder cannot prove his innocence regarding the current one. Consequently, he either acknowledges the visible judgment of God in his fate and reveals the truth or, in cases of concealment, receives punishment for a hidden crime for a murder in which he is actually not guilty. The Venerable Ephrem the Syrian provides several examples of such divine judgment upon various villains.
e) The judgment of God sometimes acts in the condemnation of a murderer through mute animals and even inanimate objects. In the Greek kingdom, during the reign of Emperor Constantine the Great, this incident occurred: a traveler was walking along a deserted road, accompanied by his pet dog. A robber attacked the traveler, killed him, and fled the scene. The animal, witnessing the murder, remained by its slain master's body without leaving his side. Another passerby buried the corpse, and the animal followed its benefactor and stayed with him. The new owner of the dog was the keeper of an inn. After some time, the hidden murderer entered the inn; the dog, who normally showed affection to all guests, suddenly, to everyone's astonishment, attacked the newcomer with barking and fiercely lunged at his face; it was commanded to stop; it did not obey and repeated its assault several times. Those who witnessed this suspected the stranger of harboring hostile intentions towards the former owner of the animal and reported this to the court. During the trial, the hiding villain confessed to the murder of a human.
Or here is another remarkable case. Two companions were walking together, when one resolved to take the life of the other in order to seize his treasure. The defenseless sufferer in the hands of the villain implored him to take the treasure, so long as he would not kill him, and earnestly promised to keep the villainous attempt a secret; yet the villain paid no heed to the sufferer's pleas. And so, when he was delivering the final fatal blow to his victim, the sound of the church bell reached them; the dying man called upon the all-seeing God to bear witness to this sacred sound against the murder and to testify against the murderer. With a wicked mockery of the dying man's helplessness and the futility of his hopes, the villain completed the act. And what of it? From that time onward, the murderer could not peacefully hear the sound of the church bell: every time he heard it, the villain was overtaken by confusion and trembling. Tormented by the consciousness of God's judgment upon him, the criminal realized the necessity of confessing to the murder and did confess.
The Roman emperors and persecutors of Christians in the early centuries struggled to devise means to amplify the torments and the shedding of Christian blood. For all this, they either experienced divine punishment in the form of horrific and unprecedented suffering from repulsive diseases, or they met their end by their own lives and blood, shed at the hands of murderers, bringing retribution for the tortures and violent death of Christians. "O tears, tears! O Christian blood! How cruelly you avenge yourselves!" lamented more than one persecutor of Christians, recognizing the punishing hand of God upon him. (See "Sunday Readings", 1857).
III. Brethren! Let us pray to the Lord that He may deliver us not only from such a grave sin as murder, but may He also preserve us from hatred of our neighbor, for according to the judgment of Christ, everyone who hates his brother is a murderer.
Source: A Complete Annual Cycle of Short Teachings, Composed for Each Day of the Year. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
