Letter 573

To Eupeithius the Reader [anagnostes, the lector who reads Scripture in the liturgy]. That those who thrust aside and spit upon both the good thoughts that accord with nature, and the divine Scriptures, and the virtuous men who admonish them, the Lord brings to their senses sometimes through terrifying dreams, and sometimes through the salting-down of sicknesses [taricheusis, a curing as of preserved fish] - by which indeed, among various other forms of correction, God turns a person back toward the good - let Elihu persuade you, when he says in the Book of Job: "For the Lord speaks once, and a second time in a dream, or in a meditation of the night, as when a dread terror falls upon people while they are slumbering; then he uncovers the mind of human beings in forms of fear of this kind" - he terrified them, to turn a person away from injustice; he delivered his body from falling, and again he reproved him with feebleness upon a bed.

Ὅτι τοὺς παραγκωνιζομένους, καὶ διαπτύοντας τά τε κατὰ φύσιν ἀγαθὰ νοήματα, καὶ τὰ θεῖα Γραφεῖα, καὶ τοὺς νουθετοῦντας ἐναρέτους ἄνδρας, ποτὲ μὲν δι’ ὀνειράτων φοβερῶν σωφρονίζει Κύριος, ποτὲ δὲ διὰ τῆς ταριχεύσεως τῶν νόσων, ἣν δὴ ἑτέρων τινῶν ποικίλων παιδεύσεων πρὸς τὸ ἀγαθὸν ὁ Θεὸς ἐπιστρέφει τὸν ἄνθρωπον· πειθέτω σε Ἐλιούς λέγων ἐν τῇ τοῦ Ἰὼβ βίβλῳ· « Ἐν γὰρ τῷ ἅπαξ λαλῆσαι Κύριος, ἐν δὲ τῷ δευτέρῳ ἐνύπνιον, ἣν δὲ μελέτῃ νυκτερινῇ, ὡς ὅταν ἐπιπίπτει δεινὸς φόβος ἐπ’ ἀνθρώπους ἐπὶ νυσταγμάτων ἐστὶ, τότε ἀνακαλύπτει νοῦν ἀνθρώπων ἐν εἴδεσι φόβου τοιούτοις » αὐτοὺς ἐξεφόβησεν, ἀποστρέψαι ἄνθρωπον ἐξ ἀδικίας, τὸ σῶμα αὐτοῦ ἀπὸ πτώματος ἐρρύσατο, πάλιν δὲ ἤλεγξεν αὐτὸν ἐν μαλακίᾳ ἐπὶ κλίνης.