{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-6686","native_reference":{"book_number":650,"chapter_from":6,"chapter_to":6,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":6,"verse_to":6},"public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"verse-keyed-module-record","review_required":["English edition and exact text","author/work attribution","dating","verse mapping and citation kind","reuse and attribution","split author quotations and deduplicate"],"review_status":"unreviewed","source_html":"<p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: \"and have fallen away, to renew them again unto repentance, seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh and put Him to an open shame.\" \"Renew them,\" he says, \"unto repentance,\" that is, by repentance, for unto repentance is by repentance. What then, is repentance excluded? Not repentance, far from it! But the renewing again by the laver. For he did not say, \"impossible\" to be renewed \"unto repentance,\" and stop, but added how \"impossible, [by] crucifying afresh.\"</p><p>To \"be renewed,\" that is, to be made new, for to make men new is [the work] of the layer only: for (it is said) \"thy youth shall be renewed as the eagle's.\" (Ps. ciii. 5.) But it is [the work of] repentance, when those who have been made new, have afterwards become old through sins, to set them free from this old age, and to make them strong. To bring them to that former brightness however, is not possible; for there the whole was Grace.</p><p>\"Crucifying to themselves,\" he says, \"the Son of God afresh, and putting Him to an open shame.\" What he means is this. Baptism is a Cross, and \"our old man was crucified with [Him]\" (Rom. vi. 6), for we were \"made conformable to the likeness of His death\" (Rom. vi. 5; Phil. iii. 10), and again, \"we were buried therefore with Him by baptism into death.\" (Rom. vi. 4.) Wherefore, as it is not possible that Christ should be crucified a second time, for that is to \"put Him to an open shame.\" For \"if death shall no more have dominion over Him\" (Rom. vi. 9), if He rose again, by His resurrection becoming superior to death; if by death He wrestled with and overcame death, and then is crucified again, all those things become a fable and a mockery. He then that baptizeth a second time, crucifies Him again.</p><p>But what is \"crucifying afresh\"? [It is] crucifying over again. For as Christ died on the cross, so do we in baptism, not as to the flesh, but as to sin. Behold two deaths. He died as to the flesh; in our case the old man was buried, and the new man arose, made conformable to the likeness of His death. If therefore it is necessary to be baptized [again], it is necessary that this same [Christ] should die again. For baptism is nothing else than the putting to death of the baptized, and his rising again.</p><p>And he well said, \"crucifying afresh unto themselves.\" For he that does this, as having forgotten the former grace, and ordering his own life carelessly, acts in all respects as if there were another baptism. It behooves us therefore to take heed and to make ourselves safe.</p><p>On two grounds then he said that the thing was impossible, and he put the stronger last: first, because he who has been deemed worthy of such [blessings], and who has betrayed all that was granted to him, is not worthy to be again renewed; neither is it possible that [Christ] should again be crucified afresh: for this is to \"put Him to an open shame.\"</p><p>There is not then any second layer: there is not [indeed]. And if there is, there is also a third, and a fourth; for the former one is continually disannulled by the later, and this continually by another, and so on without end.<br/><i>— Homily on Hebrews 9</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: What then (you say)? Is there no repentance? There is repentance, but there is no second baptism: but repentance there is, and it has great force, and is able to set free from the burden of his sins, if he will, even him that hath been baptized much in sins, and to establish in safety him who is in danger, even though he should have come unto the very depth of wickedness. And this is evident from many places. \"For,\" says one, \"doth not he that falleth rise again? or he that turneth away, doth not he turn back to [God]?\" (Jer. viii. 4.) It is possible, if we will, that Christ should be formed in us again: for hear Paul saying, \"My little children of whom I travail in birth again, until Christ be formed in you.\" (Gal. iv. 19.) Only let us lay hold on repentance.</p><p>For behold the love of God to man! We ought on every ground to have been punished at the first; in that having received the natural law, and enjoyed innumerable blessings, we have not acknowledged our Master, and have lived an unclean life. Yet He not only has not punished us, but has even made us partakers of countless blessings, just as if we had accomplished great things. Again we fell away, and not even so does He punish us, but has given medicine of repentance, which is sufficient to put away and blot out all our sins; only if we knew the nature of the medicine, and how we ought to apply it.<br/><i>— Homily on Hebrews 9</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: \"and having fallen away.\" It is impossible to renew a city to repentance after having lost all these things and having fallen away. What then? Should we cast away repentance? May it never be, (thus says the holy Cyril in the sixth book of \"On the Veneration and Worship in Spirit and Truth\") but rather the repentance through baptism. For it is necessary first to consider repentance and the renunciation of wicked deeds, and thus to be baptized. Therefore, he says, the repentance in baptism, from which he also said, \"To renew what is proper to baptism,\" and \"To crucify again, which is also proper to this baptism.\" For those being baptized are crucified with the Lord. Therefore, he who wishes to repent again through the second baptism crucifies Christ by being crucified with Him.<br/><i>— The Pseudo-Oecumenian Catena on Hebrews</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: \"they crucify again for themselves the Son of God.\" What does it mean, crucify again for themselves the Son of God and setting an example? He says from above, crucify again for themselves and bringing shame. But he says it is of this kind; once Christ was crucified, and we too, once, are crucified with him through baptism. Therefore, he says, one who thinks there is a second baptism, as far as he is concerned, crucifies the Lord from above. For what else does the one who thinks he is being crucified a second time through baptism do, except that he also considers himself to be crucified a second time, through what he does? But to crucify a second time, he says, Christ, as far as it pertains to him, is nothing other than to set an example for him and to bring him to shame. For once crucified, he is therefore immortal. But he who re-crucifies does this as a falsehood, which brings him shame as if he had only pretended to die once.<br/><i>— The Pseudo-Oecumenian Catena on Hebrews</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: Otherwise.<br/><i>— The Pseudo-Oecumenian Catena on Hebrews</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: What does it mean to crucify again? Calling it a second crucifixion and a second passion [πάθος], if such repentance exists, and the worthiness to receive the remission through baptism was achieved only by the cross of Christ. Therefore, those who understand this desire again to see Christ being crucified, mocked, and typified. Oh, the audacity and shamelessness! If anyone contemplates such things. And indeed, through these, they shake their thoughts, so that having become hopeless of being able to attain such repentance, they strive for virtue instead.<br/><i>— The Pseudo-Oecumenian Catena on Hebrews</i></p><p><b>Photios I of Constantinople</b>: What does it mean, \"crucifying for themselves anew the Son of God and holding him up to contempt\"? He says that they crucify him again for themselves and dishonor him. This is what he means here: Christ was crucified once and for all, and we have been crucified together with him through baptism. Then he says that such a one, imagining that there is a second baptism, like their [first] baptism into him, crucifies the Lord again. For what else does the one do who intends to be crucified a second time with him than to deem that Christ has been crucified a second time through the things he does? But he says that to crucify Christ a second time (insofar as it applies to him) is nothing other than to ridicule and dishonor him. For having died once and for all he is immortal thereafter, but the one who crucifies him anew posits this lie, inasmuch as he reproaches him as a liar when he says that he died once and for all.<br/><i>— FRAGMENTS ON THE EPISTLE TO THE Hebrews 6.6</i></p><p><b>Severian of Gabala</b>: The apostles raised the dead. And this was the power of the resurrection. He said, \"hold him up to contempt,\" because if baptism is a mystery, it suffices once and for all. And if the matter happens a second time, it is an act of despising and ridicule.<br/><i>— FRAGMENTS ON THE EPISTLE TO THE Hebrews 6.6</i></p><p><b>Shepherd of Hermas</b>: Those then who are to repent, if they do repent, will be strong in faith, if they now repent while the tower is building. For if the building be finished, there will not be more room for any one, but he will be rejected. This privilege, however, will belong only to him who has now been placed near the tower.<br/><i>— Shepherd of Hermas, Vision 3</i></p><p><b>Tertullian</b>: Therefore the apostate withal will recover his former \"garment,\" the robe of the Holy Spirit; and a renewal of the \"ring,\" the sign and seal of baptism; and Christ will again be \"slaughtered; \" and he will recline on that couch from which such as are unworthily clad are wont to be lifted by the torturers, and cast away into darkness, -much more such as have been stripped.<br/><i>— On Modesty</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"29f2735e060504152e6a04d6459c89ab56c6780ff1fa20913003bff9dd34a63d","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":6686,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"8ac34ef57fcef34cec6226d9058ca24ea4d286b55c12328d4ff4ad5ed3ddaa55","translator":null,"work":null}