Monday, March 14 : Saint Athanasius

Why, then, one might say, if it were necessary for Christ to yield up his body to death on behalf of all, did he not lay it aside simply in a human way instead of going so far as to be crucified? For one might say that it was more fitting for him to have laid his body aside honorably, than ignominiously to endure such a death as that. Such an objection is itself too human, whereas what the Savior did is truly divine and worthy of his Godhead for many reasons. Firstly, because the death which befalls us all comes as a result of the weakness of our nature; for, unable to continue for long, we are dissolved with time. Hence, too, diseases befall us, and we fall sick and die. But the Lord is not weak but is the power and Word of God and life itself. If, then, he had laid aside his body somewhere in private and upon a bed, after the manner of mortal flesh, it would have been thought… there was nothing in him more than in other men… It was not fitting, either, that the Lord,who healed the diseases of others, should himself fall sick… Why, then, did he not cast out death, as he did sickness? Because it was precisely for this that he possessed a body, and it was unfitting to prevent it lest the resurrection should also be hindered… But it would be better, someone might say, to have foiled the designs of his enemies so that his body might be protected from death altogether. Now let such a one be aware that this too was unbefitting to the Lord. For as it was not fitting for the Word of God, being Life, to inflict death on his own body, so neither was it suitable for him to fly from the death inflicted by others… this did not show weakness on the Word’s part, but, on the contrary, showed Him to be both Savior and Life… the Savior came to bring to completion, not his own death, but the death of all humanity.

maronite readings – rosary,team