Homily for Great Saturday #
Metropolitan Korniliy (Titov)
Yesterday, we venerated the shroud, which is a symbol of Christ’s death. We bowed down before the long-suffering of the Lord, His Passion, and His sacrificial love for all mankind. How difficult it is to connect what we are doing now—venerating the Cross and the shroud—with what took place then, when Christ died in the flesh upon a rough wooden Cross after many sufferings. Before this dreadful execution, Christ spent the night face to face with approaching death. He prayed to the Father: “Let this cup pass from Me,” but then, having been strengthened in spirit, He said: “Nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt.” And then we hear in the Gospel how He was long tortured and beaten, and in humility died a slow death upon the Cross, never uttering a word of faintheartedness or reproach. The only words He spoke to the Father were on behalf of His tormentors: “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.”
The events of the Lord’s Passion pass before us—and all this happened to Him out of love for mankind. Christ had told His disciples earlier: “No man taketh it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself.” He fulfilled the work of our salvation to the very end, but at what cost did this saving love come!
The death of Christ speaks to us of the joy of His Resurrection, but today we behold at the Cross His weeping Mother, the Most Pure Virgin, who offers to the world a priceless Gift—Her Son, for the salvation of the world. She loved Him as no one else in this world. He dies, and She, in her compassion, dies with Him in spirit—and in her long-suffering, she forgives the murderers of her Divine Son, in order to gain the right to pray before Him for our salvation. This right the Most Holy Mother of God received by her participation in the crucifixion of her Son.
Then the Lord’s body was taken down from the Cross by His disciples, who had once been secret followers, but now in the face of death came forth without fear. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus carried the Lord’s body to a tomb in the garden of Gethsemane.
And now before us is the shroud, where Christ’s body is depicted, surrounded by His Mother and disciples. As we bow down before this holy image, let us do so with deep reverence and trembling, comprehending with our whole soul that the horror of Christ’s death rests upon one thing: our sin. Each one of us, in our sinfulness, bears responsibility for this death, for it occurred because we lose the fear of God and stray from His commandments. And as we look upon the shroud, let us hear the lament of the Mother of God, feel the dread of the disciples, and the sorrow and groaning of all creation.
Let us give thanks to God for our salvation, which was purchased by Jesus Christ and the Mother of God at such a dreadful and terrible price, and which is so freely available to us—yet which we often pass by with indifference. Let us glorify God for the Cross, for death, and for the fact that for us, death is no longer the end, but only the sleep of repose—the beginning of eternity.
Today we dwell in the silence of the most blessed Saturday, when the Lord rested in the flesh from His sufferings. All that was most terrible and agonizing has come to an end, and as we behold His body depicted on the shroud, we may be filled with a sense of peace and calm. The Lord descended into the abyss and the depths of Hades, into the place where there is neither God nor hope. When He entered that realm, Hades trembled and was struck with terror, and a miracle occurred—Hades lost its power and was conquered. In the Resurrection of Christ, heaven, earth, and the netherworld were filled with light. When the Victor over death, Jesus, appeared in Hades, all its captives were illumined with the light of Christ, and the righteous who had awaited Him emerged from the dark prison, following the triumphant Shepherd. Jesus Christ, by His divinity, by His Cross, and by His light, bound the dark and evil power of the devil and set free the whole enslaved race of man.
Before the Resurrection of Christ, death was terrifying to man—it separated him from God and from those he loved. But after the Resurrection, immortality shone forth, and in place of death, man received repose and eternal life. “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” (1 Corinthians 15:55), exclaims the Apostle with triumphant joy.
St. Gregory Palamas, in his homilies for Great Saturday, writes: “By His sacrifice, Christ freed us from the bondage of the devil and of death, offering His own blood as a ransom. He redeemed us from guilt, forgiving our sins and tearing up the handwriting of our debts upon the Cross. He redeemed us from the tyranny of the devil, who was tightly bound and publicly put to shame by the Cross of Christ.” The holy bishop continues: “Let us then, imitating Christ through our righteousness, overcome the prince of darkness, repelling his attacks and his incitements to evil passions. And though Christ has conquered and bound the author of evil, casting him out of the souls of men, yet He allows him to strike from without, that the renewed man, living according to the Gospel of Christ—in virtue and repentance, bearing sufferings and being tempered by them—might prepare himself in this age for the inheritance of the heavenly blessings to come.”
The death of Christ has forever drawn out of Hades all that is capable of life; it has abolished the horror of mortal enslavement. Now we call death repose—a temporary sleep. The sufferings of Christ have sanctified our earthly sufferings for the sake of truth and faith, replacing God’s wrath with hope for salvation in the Kingdom of eternal glory. What, then, is our tomb now? It is no longer a hopeless, terrifying place of corruption, but a blessed bed of rest, upon which our body, wearied by life’s struggle, peacefully lies until the joyful dawn of the Resurrection. And the grave of the righteous is God’s field, where the perishable is sown, that it might be raised in incorruption. When a righteous person departs from this life, he departs not into the abyss of God-forsakenness and despair, but unto God, who has loved us so greatly that He gave His Only-Begotten and Beloved Son as a sacrifice, that we might believe in His love. He died so that we might believe that we are loved by Him—and therefore, dying with Him, we may also rise with Him unto eternal life, casting off from our soul, like an old garment, all that is corruptible and passing away.
And now, in death, we see not lifeless, dry bones, not terror or hopelessness, but a joy full of life—the joy of the Resurrection to come, and the victory over death. Already we may glorify the Resurrection before the shroud, upon which is depicted the suffering body of Jesus, who has conquered death. And this victory we shall soon celebrate, singing with rejoicing, awaiting with hope and gladness that moment when the Paschal news reaches us, when the triumphant hymn of Christ’s Resurrection will thunder forth in every church!
May the Lord grant us to partake of that joy!