Толкование на группу стихов: Вар: 3: 14-14
A GARDEN WHERE VIRTUES BLOOM. METHODIUS: As soon as souls have left this world, it is said that the angels meet them with much rejoicing and conduct them to those very pastures to which they were longing to come, imagining them from far away when, still dwelling in their bodies, they dreamed of the divine world. When, therefore, they have come there, they see wonderful and glorious and blessed things of beauty, and such as cannot be spoken to humanity. They see there righteousness, prudence, love, truth, temperance and other flowers and plants of wisdom, equally splendid. We see here only the shadows and apparitions of them, as in dreams, and think that they consist of human actions because there is no clear image of them here but only dim copies that themselves we often see when making dark copies of them. No one, in fact has been able to contemplate with his own eyes the greatness, the magnificence and the beauty of the justice, the intelligence or the peace. But there, in him whose name is I AM, they are seen perfect and clear as they are. For there is a tree of temperance and of love and of understanding, just as there are plants of the fruits that grow here—as of grapes, pomegranates and apples. And so, too, the fruits of those trees are gathered and eaten and do not perish and wither. Instead, those who gather them grow toward immortality and a likeness to God. Just as he from whom all are descended, before the fall and the blinding of his eyes, being in paradise, enjoyed its fruits, God appointing man to dress and to keep the plants of wisdom. For it was entrusted to the first Adam to cultivate those fruits. Now Jeremiah saw that these things exist in a certain particular place, removed a great distance from our world, where, deploring the state of those who have fallen from that good state, he says, “Learn where wisdom is found, where strength is, where understanding is so that you may also know where length of days, life, the light of the eyes and peace are. Who has found her place or who has come on her treasures? SYMPOSIUM OR BANQUET OF THE TEN VIRGINS 8.2-3.
