The Peril of Abandoned Flocks

To serve as an 'man in Christ' is to say that there is no difference in stating that man is a soul of God. For Elijah is called a man serving God and a soul of God; likewise Moses the hierophant, and if anyone else partakes of the same holiness and virtue.

There is no need for many testimonies now, since much proof has already been given; for it is sufficient to take up the voice of Paul and Peter. For what Paul wrote: 'Every soul'—that is, man—'must be subject to the superior authorities' (Rom 13:5); and what Peter said: 'That is, eight souls were saved,' saying eight souls regarding those saved in the ark during the flood: Noah and his three sons, his wife, and the three living with his sons (1 Pet 3:20).

This so-called soul of God is weighed down by the three shepherds being removed in a single month, being indignant at the one who removed them from the Savior. And their removal happens because, like the manner of lions, their souls were being torn by savagery against the true shepherd.

Since the coarseness of the shepherds is described, the good chief-shepherd, regarding the sheep lost by the wicked shepherds, says in the manner of the threat 'I will not shepherd you,' especially since they were still being lost by the harmful ones; for they had not yet been removed; for 'I will remove the three shepherds' shows that they were at the height of being placed over the flocks led astray by them.

By what manner and for whose sake one of the rods is called beautiful and the other a fragment, it should be made clear in the places where they will not yet be exposed. But now it is necessary to say with God: 'Let the dying die, and let the lacking fail, and let the remnants be eaten, each one the flesh of his neighbor' (Zech 11:9).

Under the good shepherd overseeing the flock, each of the sheep is cared for in the necessary way. Immediately, also, the Lord Jesus says: 'My sheep hear my voice and follow...'

“...to me, and I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish for ever,” just as each of those completing the divine flock cries out concerning the shepherd: “The Lord shepherds me, and I shall lack nothing. In a place of green pasture, there He has made me abide; by the waters of rest He has nourished me, He has restored my soul. He has led me upon the paths of righteousness for the sake of His name.”

Thus, when the spiritual nourishment is neglected due to their own idleness, left behind by the one saying, “I will not shepherd you,” the opposite happens to the flocks, such that the dying indeed die, having been distanced from the one saying, the shepherd, concerning his own sheep: “I came that they might have life and have it abundantly, having laid down my life for the sheep.”

In the dying of the dying, and in the failing that shall cease, having been desolated of protection, just as each of those who have fallen away from the proper pasture of the neighbor to eat their flesh, having turned into savagery. By this savagery, the Church of the Galatians having fallen, it is fittingly written against her by the apostle Paul: “But if you bite and devour one another, see that you are not consumed by one another.” Concerning thus being reduced to a beast-like state, the hymnist sings: “In the approaching of those doing evil to me to eat my flesh.”

Furthermore, if even those were so determined, the one remaining unharmed says: “Those who trouble me and my enemies themselves have grown weak and have fallen.” And the prophet Jeremiah, concerning the beasts who attempt harm against the diligent, says: “Holy Israel, the Lord is the beginning of his generations; all those who devour him shall err, and evil shall come upon them, says the Lord.”

And indeed, it is better to say 'to devour' each one the flesh, rather than the soul or the mind of the neighbors.

The one having escaped from this savagery, rejoicing for himself and for those near him, cries out: “Blessed is the Lord, who does not...