NPNF2-08. Basil: Letters and Select Works - Holy Bible Institute

Of the origin of the word “with,” and what force it has. Also concerning the unwrittenlaws of the church.ἀνάστασις) we remind ourselves of the grace given to us by standing at prayer, not onlybecause we rose with Christ, 1279 and are bound to “seek those things which are above,” 1280but because the day seems to us to be in some sense an image of the age which we expect,wherefore, though it is the beginning of days, it is not called by Moses first, but one. 1281For he says “There was evening, and there was morning, one day,” as though the same dayoften recurred. Now “one” and “eighth” are the same, in itself distinctly indicating thatreally “one” and “eighth” of which the Psalmist makes mention in certain titles of the Psalms,the state which follows after this present time, the day which knows no waning or eventide,and no successor, that age which endeth not or groweth old. 1282 Of necessity, then, thechurch teaches her own foster children to offer their prayers on that day standing, to theend that through continual reminder of the endless life we may not neglect to make provisionfor our removal thither. Moreover all Pentecost is a reminder of the resurrection expectedin the age to come. For that one and first day, if seven times multiplied by seven, completesthe seven weeks of the holy Pentecost; for, beginning at the first, Pentecost ends with thesame, making fifty revolutions through the like intervening days. And so it is a likeness ofeternity, beginning as it does and ending, as in a circling course, at the same point. On thisday the rules of the church have educated us to prefer the upright attitude of prayer, for bytheir plain reminder they, as it were, make our mind to dwell no longer in the present butin the future. Moreover every time we fall upon our knees and rise from off them we shewby the very deed that by our sin we fell down to earth, and by the loving kindness of ourCreator were called back to heaven.67. Time will fail me if I attempt to recount the unwritten mysteries of the Church. Ofthe rest I say nothing; but of the very confession of our faith in Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,what is the written source? If it be granted that, as we are baptized, so also under the obligationto believe, we make our confession in like terms as our baptism, in accordance withthe tradition of our baptism and in conformity with the principles of true religion, let ouropponents grant us too the right to be as consistent in our ascription of glory as in ourconfession of faith. If they deprecate our doxology on the ground that it lacks written authority,let them give us the written evidence for the confession of our faith and the othermatters which we have enumerated. While the unwritten traditions are so many, and theirbearing on “the mystery of godliness” 1283 is so important, can they refuse to allow us a single431279 “Stood again with”—συναναστάντες.1280 Col. iii. 1.1281 Gen. i. 5. Heb. LXX. Vulg. R.V. cf. p. 64.1282 Vide Titles to Pss. vi. and xii. in A.V. “upon Sheminith,” marg. “the eighth.” LXX ὑπὲρ τῆς ὀγδόης.Vulg. pro octava. On various explanations of the Hebrew word vide Dict Bib. S. V. where Dr. Aldis Wright inclinesto the view that it is a tune or key, and that the Hebrews were not acquainted with the octave.1283 1 Tim. iii. 16.234