{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/213/2130256.htm","path":"chr/ecf/213/2130256.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/213/2130256.htm","text":"p. 279 Hymn IX.\n(Resp., Blessed is He Who came down, and sanctified water for the remission of the sins of the children of Adam!)\n1. O John, who sawest the Spirit,\u2014that abode on the head of the Son,\u2014to show how the Head of the Highest\u2014went down and was baptized\u2014and came up to be Head on earth!\u2014Children of the Spirit ye have thus become,\u2014and Christ has become for you the Head:\u2014ye also have become His members.\n2. Consider and see how exalted ye are;\u2014how instead of the river Jordan\u2014ye have glorious Baptism, wherein is peace;\u2014spreading her wings to shade your bodies.\u2014In the wilderness John baptized:\u2014in Her pure flood of Baptism,\u2014purely are ye baptized therein.\n3. Infants think when they see its glory,\u2014that by its pomp its might is enhanced.\u2014But it is the same, and within itself\u2014is not divided.\u2014But the might which never waxes less or greater\u2014in us is little or again great;\u2014and he in whom is great understanding,\u2014great in him is Baptism.\n4. A man\u2019s knowledge, if it be exalted,\u2014exalted also is his degree above his brethren;\u2014and he whose faith is great,\u2014so also is his promise;\u2014and as is his wisdom, so also his crowning.\u2014As is the light, which though it be all goodly\u2014and equal all of it with itself,\u2014yet goodlier is one eye than another.\n5. Jesus mingled His might in the water:\u2014put ye Him on my brethren as discerning men!\u2014For there are that in the water merely\u2014perceive that they are washed. With our body be our soul washed!\u2014The manifest water let the body perceive,\u2014and the soul the secret might;\u2014that both to the manifest and to the secret ye may be made like!\n6. How beautiful is Baptism\u2014in the eye of the heart; come, let us gaze on it!\u2014Like as by a seal ye have been moulded;\u2014receive ye its image,\u2014that nought may be lacking to us of our image!\u2014For the sheep that are white of heart\u2014gaze on the glory that is in the water:\u2014in your souls reflect ye it!\n7. Water is by nature as a mirror,\u2014for one who in it examines himself.\u2014Stir up thy soul, thou that discernest,\u2014and be like unto it!\u2014For it in its midst reflects thy image;\u2014from it, on it, find an example;\u2014gaze in it on Baptism,\u2014and put on the beauty that is hidden therein!\n8. What profits it him that hears\u2014a voice and knows not its significance?\u2014Whoso hears a voice and is devoid\u2014of the understanding thereof,\u2014his ear is filled but his soul is empty.\u2014Lo! since the gift is abundant,\u2014with discernment receive ye it.\n9. Baptism that is with understanding\u2014is the conjunction of two lights,\u2014and rich are the fountains of its rays.\u2014\u2026\u2026\u2014And the darkness that is on the mind departs,\u2014and the soul beholds Him in beauty,\u2014the hidden Christ of glory,\u2014and grieves when the glory fails.\n10. Baptism without understanding\u2014is a treasure full yet empty;\u2014since he that receives it is poor in it,\u2014for he understands not\u2014how great are its riches into which he enters and dwells.\u2014For great is the gift within it,\u2014though the mean man perceives not\u2014that he is exalted even as it.\n11. Open wide your minds and see, my brethren,\u2014the secret column in the air, whose base is fixed from the midst of the water\u2014unto the door of the Highest Place, like the ladder that Jacob saw.\u2014Lo! by it came down the light unto Baptism,\u2014and by it the soul goes up to Heaven,\u2014that in one love we may be mingled.\np. 280 12. Our Lord when he was baptized by John\u2014sent forth twelve fountains;\u2014and they issued forth and cleansed by their streams\u2014the defilement of the peoples.\u2014His worshippers are made white like His garments,\u2014the garments in Tabor and the body in the water.\u2014Instead of the garments the peoples are made white,\u2014and have become for Him a clothing of glory.\n13. From your garments learn, my brethren,\u2014how your members should be kept.\u2014For if the garment, which ever so many times\u2014may be made clean,\u2014is duly kept for the sake of its comeliness,\u2014the body which has but one baptism\u2014manifold more exceeding is the care of its keeping,\u2014for manifold are its dangers.\n14. Again the sun in a house that is strait,\u2014is straitened therein though he be great:\u2014but in a house that is goodly and large,\u2014when he rises thereon\u2014far and wide in it he spreads his rays;\u2014and though the sun is one and the same in his nature,\u2014in divers houses he undergoes changes:\u2014Even so our Lord in divers men.","title":"Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Ser. II, Vol. XIII: Selections from the Hymns and Homilies of Ephraim the Syrian and from the Demonstrations of Aphrahat the Persian Sage.: Hymn IX.","type":"page"}