The beautiful unbelief of St Thomas

by Nicholas

Τῶν Μαθητῶν δισταζόντων τῇ ὀγδόῃ ἡμέρᾳ, ἐπέστη ὁ Σωτήρ, οὗ ἦσαν συνηγμένοι, καὶ τὴν εἰρήνην δοὺς τῷ Θωμᾷ ἐβόησε· Δεῦρο Ἀπόστολε ψηλάφησον παλάμας, αἷς τούς ἥλους ἔπηξαν. Ὦ καλὴ ἀπιστία τοῦ Θωμᾶ! τῶν πιστῶν τὰς καρδίας εἰς ἐπίγνωσιν ἦξε καὶ μετὰ φόβου ἐβόησεν· ὁ Κύριός μου καὶ ὁ Θεός μου, δόξα σοι.

WHEN his disciples were sunk in doubt that eighth day, the Saviour appeared, in the place where they were met together, and bestowing the peace he cried out to Thomas: ‘Come, Apostle, with thy finger search the palms through which they drove the nails’. Oh! the beautiful unbelief of Thomas! He brought the hearts of the faithful to acknowledgment, and with fear he cried out: My Lord and my God, glory be to thee!

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An icon of St Thomas the Apostle. Monk Moses writes, “Thomas is not a skeptic who is isolated and disadvantaged. He dares, he searches, he investigates, he inquires”.

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For the story, see John 20:19-31.

τῶν Μαθητῶν δισταζόντων “while the Disciples were doubting/hesitating” suggests that Thomas was not alone in his doubts, even though the others had seen Jesus already and he had not.

καλὴ ἀπιστία is generally translated “good unbelief”, but καλός carries more of a sense of “beautiful” than simply “good”. St Thomas’s unbelief was a thing of beauty. One way of looking at this is given to us by monk Moses of the Holy Mountain, praising Thomas because “he dares, he searches, he investigates, he inquires. He asks for the truth, to have direct contact with it. Christ did not have problem offering it to him. He came back to meet him. He comes back to everyone of us”. As St Peter of Damaskos wrote,

ONE cannot become a craftsman simply by hearsay: one has to practice, and watch, and make numerous mistakes, and be corrected by those with experience, so that through long perseverance and by eliminating one’s own desires one eventually masters the art. Similarly, spiritual knowledge is not acquired simply through study but is given by God through grace to the humble.

See also Psalm 33[34]:8-10 and 1 John 1:1-4.