CHRISTOS ANESTI! CHRIST IS RISEN!
Pascha, our Passing over into Life
Finally! The Hebrew Scriptures have been opened
and the mystery declared:
how the sheep was sacrificed, and how
a people were redeemed,
and Pharaoh wincing, lashed by unsuspected mystery.
Therefore, all-beloved, apprehend
the secrets of the Pascha.
See that they contain both new and old,
eternal and provisional,
what passes and what will never pass away,
mortal and immortal, both.
For the law is old, but the world—have you noticed?—
is suddenly new; the figure is
provisional, while grace is everlasting.
The trembling sheep is mortal,
but the Lord—unbroken as the lamb, raised up
by God’s sure hand, is deathless.
~ Saint Melito of Sardis (+ c. 190)
Christ Speaks
It is I, speaks the Christ, I am he
who puts Death to death, and stands above
the fallen enemy, crushes Hades
to bland chalk, binds the dark powers, and bears
all humankind up to heavenly peaks.
Yes, says Christ, I am he.
Therefore, come, all human families
ruined by sin, and receive absolution
of every error. I am your liberation
and the passage of deliverance.
I am the throat-cut lamb and sacrifice,
your ransom paid, your pulse and life, your fire,
your rescue, resurrection, and your king.
I gather you in one strong hand,
and guide you to the heights of paradise,
where I will show to you your Father.
~ Saint Melito of Sardis (+ c. 190)
The Death of Death
Put fear aside. Now
that He has entered
into death on our behalf,
all who live
no longer die
as men once died.
That ephemeral occasion
has met its utter end.
As seeds cast to the earth, we
will not perish,
but like those seeds
shall rise again—the shroud
of death itself having been
burst to tatters
by love’s immensity.
~Saint Athanasios
From Scott Cairns, Love’s Immensity: Mystics on the Endless Life
