Προτροπὴ ἐπίτομος καὶ ἰσοδύναμος τῶν διὰ πλάτους εἰρημένων
The Call to Ascend
The author exhorts the faithful to pursue spiritual maturity and the fullness of love, mirroring the ascent to the mountain of God.
Keep climbing, brothers—eagerly build ascents in your hearts as you listen to the one who says: Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and into the house of our God, who makes our feet like a deer's and sets us on the heights, so that we may conquer in his way. Run, I beg you, with the one who says: Let us press on until we all arrive at the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of God, into a mature person, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ—who, baptized at the visible age of thirty, was allotted the thirtieth step on the noetic ladder, if indeed Love is God: to whom belong hymn, dominion, and strength; in whom is the cause of every good, who was and will be unto ages without end.1
Read the original Latin
Ἀναβαίνετε, ἀναβαίνετε, ἀναβάσεις προθύμως ἐν καρδίᾳ τιθέμενοι, ἀδελφοὶ, τοῦ φάσκοντος ἀκούοντες· Δεῦτε, ἀναβῶμεν εἰς τὸ ὅρος Κυρίου· καὶ εἰς τὸν οἶκον τοῦ Θεοῦ ἡμῶν τοῦ καταρτίζοντος τοὺς πόδας ἡμῶν ὡσεὶ ἐλάφου, καὶ ἐπὶ τὰ ὑψηλὰ ἱστῶντος, τοῦ νικῆσαι ἐν τῇ ὁδῷ αὐτοῦ. Δράμετε, δυσωπῶ, μετ᾿ ἐκείνου τοῦ λέγοντος· Σπουδάσωμεν ἕως οὗ καταντήσωμεν εἰς τὴν ἑνότητα πάντες τῆς πίστεως, καὶ τῆς ἐπιγνώσεως τοῦ Θεοῦ εἰς ἄνδρα τέλειον εἰς μέτρον ἡλικίας τοῦ πληρώματος τοῦ Χριστοῦ, ὃς τριακονταέτης τῇ ὁρωμένῃ ἡλικίᾳ βαπτισθεὶς, τὸν τριακοστὸν βαθμὸν ἐν τῇ νοερᾷ κλίμακι ἐκληρώσατο· εἴπερ ἡ ἀγάπη ἐστὶν ὁ Θεός· ᾧ ὕμνος, ᾧ κράτος, ᾧ σθένος· ᾧ τὸ πάντων ἀγαθῶν αἴτιον ἔνεστι, καὶ ἦν, καὶ ἔσται εἰς ἀορίστους αἰῶνας.
Notes
- 1 ↩εἴπερ ἡ ἀγάπη ἐστὶν ὁ Θεός inverts the usual Johannine order (God is love) to identify the thirtieth rung—love—with God; rendered 'if indeed Love is God' to keep both the conditional force of εἴπερ and Climacus's intentional equation.
The Ladder of Divine Ascent (Lestvitsa) companion
A prayer for every moment, already on your phone
Chosen Portion puts a curated historic prayer in front of you each day — so the words are there before the moment arrives.
Chosen Portion is the digital descendant of the carried prayer book: the short daily prayers this collection preserves, delivered one a day to your pocket.
- One short, memorable prayer delivered daily — build your repertoire a card at a time
- Prayers matched to real situations: fear, gratitude, decisions, grief, sleep
- Save favourites into your personal pocket collection you can open anywhere