PREFACE.

1. By transmitting to thee, my very dear friend, this fourth book of the work which is [entitled] The  Detection and Refuation of False Knowledge, I shall, as I have promised, add weight, by means of  the words of the Lord, to what I have already advanced; so that thou also, as thou hast requested,  mayest obtain from me the means of confuting all the heretics everywhere, and not permit them,  beaten back at all points, to launch out further into the deep of error, nor to be drowned in the sea  of ignorance; but that thou, turning them into the haven of the truth, mayest cause them to attain  their salvation.

2. The man, however, who would undertake their conversion, must possess an accurate  knowledge of their systems or schemes of doctrine. For it is impossible for any one to heal the sick,  if he has no knowledge of the disease of the patients. This was the reason that my predecessors-- much superior men to myself, too--were unable, notwithstanding, to refute the Valentinians  satisfactorily, because they were ignorant of these men's system;(1) which I have with all care  delivered to thee in the first book in which I have also shown that their doctrine is a recapitulation  of all the heretics. For which reason also, in the second, we have had, as in a mirror, a sight of  their entire discomfiture. For they who oppose these men (the Valentinians) by the right method,  do [thereby] oppose all who are of an evil mind; and they who overthrow them, do in fact  overthrow every kind of heresy.

3. For their system is blasphemous above all [others], since they represent that the Maker and  Framer, who is one God, as I have shown, was produced from a defect or apostasy. They utter  blasphemy, also, against our Lord, by cutting off and dividing Jesus from Christ, and Christ from  the Saviour, and again the Saviour from the Word, and the Word from the Only-begotten. And  since they allege that the Creator originated from a defect or apostasy, so have they also taught that  Christ and the Holy Spirit were emitted on account of this defect, and that the Saviour was a  product of those Aeons who were produced from a defect; so that there is nothing but blasphemy to  be found among them. In the preceding book, then, the ideas of the apostles as to all these points  have been set forth, [to the effect] that not only did they, "who from the beginning were eye- witnesses and ministers of the word"(2) of truth, hold no such opinions, but that they did also  preach to us to shun these doctrines,(3) foreseeing by the Spirit those weak-minded persons who  should be led astray.(4)  4. For as the serpent beguiled Eve, by promising her what he had not himself,(5) so also do these  men, by pretending [to possess] superior knowledge, and [to be acquainted with] ineffable  mysteries; and, by promising that admittance which they speak of as taking place within the  Pleroma, plunge those that believe them into death, rendering them apostates from Him who made  them. And at that time, indeed, the apostate angel, having effected the disobedience of mankind by  means of the serpent, imagined that he escaped the notice of the Lord; wherefore God assigned him  the form(6) and name [of a serpent]. But now, since the last times are [come upon us], evil is  spread abroad among men, which not only renders them apostates, but by many machinations does  [the devil] raise up blasphemers against the Creator, namely, by means of all the heretics already  mentioned. For all these, although they issue forth from diverse regions, and promulgate different  [opinions], do nevertheless concur in the same blasphemous design, wounding [men] unto death,  by teaching blasphemy against God our Maker and Supporter, and derogating from the salvation of  man. Now man is a mixed organization of soul and flesh, who was formed after the likeness of  God, and moulded by His hands, that is, by the Son and Holy Spirit, to whom also He said, "Let Us  make man."(1) This, then, is the aim of him who envies our life, to render men disbelievers in their  own salvation, and blasphemous against God the Creator. For whatsoever all the heretics may have  advanced with the utmost solemnity, they come to this at last, that they blaspheme the Creator, and  disallow the salvation of God's workmanship, which the flesh truly is; on behalf of which I have  proved, in a variety of ways, that the Son of God accomplished the whole dispensation [of mercy],  and have shown that there is none other called God by the Scriptures except the Father of all, and  the Son, and those who possess the adoption.

CHAP. I.--THE LORD ACKNOWLEDGED BUT ONE GOD AND FATHER.

1. Since, therefore, this is sure and stedfast, that no other God or Lord was announced by the  Spirit, except Him who, as God, rules over all, together with His Word, and those who receive the  Spirit of adoption,(2) that is, those who believe in the one and true God, and in Jesus Christ the  Son of God; and likewise that the apostles did Of themselves term no one else as God, or name [no  other] as Lord; and, what is much more important, [since it is true] that our Lord [acted likewise],  who did also command us to confess no one as Father, except Him who is in the heavens, who is  the one God and the one Father;--those things are clearly shown to be false which these deceivers  and most perverse sophists advance, maintaining that the being whom they have themselves  invented is by nature both God and Father; but that the I Demiurge is naturally neither God nor  Father, but is so termed merely by courtesy (verbo tenus), because of his ruling the creation, these  perverse mythologists state, setting their thoughts against God; and, putting aside the doctrine of  Christ, and of themselves divining falsehoods, they dispute against the entire dispensation of God.  For they maintain that their Aeons, and gods, and fathers, and lords, are also still further termed  heavens, together with their Mother, whom they do also call "the Earth," and "Jerusalem," while  they also style her many other names.

2. Now to whom is it not clear, that if the Lord had known many fathers and gods, He would not  have taught His disciples to know [only] one God,(3) and to call Him alone Father? But He did the  rather distinguish those who by word merely (verbo tenus) are termed gods, from Him who is truly  God, that they should not err as to His doctrine, nor understand one [in mistake] for another. And  if He did indeed teach us to call one Being Father and God, while He does from time to time  Himself confess other fathers and gods in the same sense, then He will appear to enjoin a different  course upon His disciples from what He follows Himself. Such conduct, however, does not bespeak  the good teacher, but a misleading and invidious one. The apostles, too, according to these men's  showing, are proved to be transgressors of the commandment, since they confess the Creator as  God, and Lord, and Father, as I have shown--if He is not alone God and Father. Jesus, therefore,  will be to them the author and teacher of such transgression, inasmuch as He commanded that one  Being should be called Father,(4) thus imposing upon them the necessity of confessing the Creator  as their Father, as has been pointed out.

CHAP.II.--PROOFS FROM THE PLAIN TESTIMONY OF MOSES, AND OF THE OTHER  PROPHETS, WHOSE WORDS ARE THE WORDS OF CHRIST, THAT THERE IS BUT ONE  GOD, THE FOUNDER OF THE WORLD, WHOM OUR LORD PREACHED, AND WHOM HE  CALLED HIS FATHER.

1. Moses, therefore, making a recapitulation of the whole law, which he had received from the  Creator (Demiurge), thus speaks in Deuteronomy: "Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and  hear, O earth, the words of my mouth."(5) Again, David saying that his help came from the Lord,  asserts: "My help is from the LORD, who made heaven and earth."(6) And Esaias confesses that  words were uttered by God, who made heaven and earth, and governs them. He says: "Hear, O  heavens; and give ear, O earth: for the LORD hath spoken."(7) And again: "Thus saith the LORD  God, who made the heaven, and stretched it out; who established the earth, and the things in it;  and who giveth breath to the people upon it, and spirit to them who walk therein."(8)

2. Again, our Lord Jesus Christ confesses this same Being as His Father, where He says: "I confess to thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth."(1) What Father will those men have us to  understand [by these words], those who are most perverse sophists of Pandora? Whether shall it be  Bythus, whom they have fabled of themselves; or their Mother; or the Only-begotten? Or shall it be  he whom the Marcionites or the others have invented as god (whom I indeed have amply  demonstrated to be no god at all); or shall it be (what is really the case) the Maker of heaven and  earth, whom also the prophets proclaimed,--whom Christ, too, confesses as His Father,--whom also  the law announces, saying: "Hear, O Israel; The Lord thy God is one God?"(2)

3. But since the writings (litera) of Moses are the words of Christ, He does Himself declare to the  Jews, as John has recorded in the Gospel: "If ye had believed Moses, ye would have believed Me:  for he wrote of Me. But if ye believe not his writings, neither will ye believe My words."(3) He thus  indicates in the cleareat manner that the writings of Moses are His words. If, then, [this be the case  with regard] to Moses, so also, beyond a doubt, the words of the other prophets are His [words], as I  have pointed out. And again, the Lord Himself exhibits Abraham as having said to the rich man,  with reference to all those who were still alive: "If they do not obey Moses and the prophets,  neither, if any one were to rise from the dead and go to them, will they believe him."(4)

4. Now, He has not merely related to us a story respecting a poor man and a rich one; but He has  taught us, in the first place, that no one should lead a luxurious life, nor, living in worldly  pleasures and perpetual feastings, should be the slave of his lusts, and forget God. "For there was,"  He says, "a rich man, who was clothed in purple and fine linen, and delighted himself with  splendid feasts."(5) Of such persons, too, the Spirit has spoken by Esaias: "They drink wine with [the  accompaniment of] harps, and tablets, and psalteries, and flutes; but they regard not the works of  God, neither do they consider the work of His hands."(6) Lest, therefore, we should incur the same  punishment as these men, the Lord reveals [to us] their end; showing at the same time, that if they  obeyed Moses and the prophets, they would believe in Him whom these had preached, the Son of  God, who rose from the dead, and bestows life upon us; and He shows that all are from one  essence, that is, Abraham, and Moses, and the prophets, and also the Lord Himself, who rose from  the dead, in whom many believe who are of the circumcision, who do also hear Moses and the  prophets announcing the coming of the Son of God. But those who scoff [at the truth] assert that  these men were from another essence, and they do not know the first-begotten from the dead;  understanding Christ as a distinct being, who continued as if He were impassible, and Jesus, who  suffered, as being altogether separate [from Him].

5. For they do not receive from the Father the knowledge of the Son; neither do they learn who  the Father is from the Son, who teaches clearly and without parables Him who truly is God. He  says: "Swear not at all; neither by heaven, for it is God's throne; nor by the earth, for it is His  footstool; neither by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King."(7) For these words are evidently  spoken with reference to the Creator, as also Esaias says: "Heaven is my throne, the earth is my  footstool."(8) And besides this Being there is no other God; otherwise He would not be termed by  the Lord either" God" or" the great King;" for a Being who can be so described admits neither of  any other being compared with nor set above Him. For he who has any superior over him, and is  under the power of another, this being never can be called either "God" or "the great King."

6. But neither will these men be able to maintain that such words were uttered in an ironical  manner, since it is proved to them by the words themselves that they were in earnest. For He who  uttered them was Truth, and did truly vindicate His own house, by driving out of it the changers of  money, who were buying and selling, saying unto them: "It is written, My house shall be called the  house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves."(9) And what reason had He for thus doing  and saying, and vindicating His house, if He did preach another God? But [He did so], that He  might point out the transgressors of His Father's law; for neither did He bring any accusation  against the house, nor did He blame the law, which He had come to fulfil; but He reproved those  who were putting His house to an improper use, and those who were transgressing the law. And  therefore the scribes and Pharisees, too, who from the times of the law had begun to despise God,  did not receive His Word, that is, they did not believe on Christ. Of these Esaias says: "Thy princes  are rebellious, companions of thieves, loving gifts, following after rewards, not judging the  fatherless, and negligent of the cause of the widows."(10) And Jeremiah, in like manner:  "They," he says, "who rule my people did not know me; they are senseless and imprudent children;  they are wise to do evil, but to do well they have no knowledge."(1)

7. But as many as feared God, and were anxious about His law, these ran to Christ, and were all  saved. For He said to His disciples: "Go ye to the sheep of the house of Israel,(2) which have  perished." And many more Samaritans, it is said, when the Lord had tarried among. them, two  days, "believed because of His words, and said to the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy  saying, for we ourselves have heard [Him], and know that this man is truly the Saviour of the  world."(3) And Paul likewise declares, "And so all Israel shall be saved;"(4) but he has also said,  that the law was our pedagogue [to bring us] to Christ Jesus.(5) Let them not therefore ascribe to  the law the unbelief of certain [among them]. For the law never hindered them from believing in  the Son of God; nay, but it even exhorted them(6) so to do, saying(7) that men can be saved in no  other way from the old wound of the serpent than by believing in Him who, in the likeness of sinful  flesh, is lifted up from the earth upon the tree of martyrdom, and draws all things to Himself,(8)  and vivifies the dead.

CHAP. III.--ANSWER TO THE CAVILS OF THE GNOS TICS. WE ARE NOT TO SUPPOSE  THAT THE TRUE GOD CAN BE CHANGED, OR COME TO AN END BECAUSE THE  HEAVENS, WHICH ARE HIS THRONE AND THE EARTH, HIS FOOTSTOOL, SHALL PASS  AWAY.

1. Again, as to their malignantly asserting that if heaven is indeed the throne of God, and earth  His footstool, and if it is declared that the heaven and earth shall pass away, then when these pass  away the God who sitteth above must also pass away, and therefore He cannot be the God who is  over all; in the first place, they are ignorant what the expression means, that heaven is [His] throne  and earth [His] footstool. For they do not know what God is, but they imagine that He sits after the  fashion of a man, and is contained within bounds, but does not contain. And they are also  unacquainted with [the meaning of] the passing away of the heaven and earth; but Paul was not  ignorant of it when he declared, "For the figure of this world passeth away."(9) In the next place,  David explains their question, for he says that when the fashion of this world passes away, not only  shall God remain, but His servants also, expressing himself thus in the 101st Psalm: "In the  beginning, Thou; O LORD, hast founded the earth, and the heavens are the works of Thy hands.  They shall perish, but Thou shalt endure, and all shall wax old as a garment; and as a vesture Thou  shalt change them, and they shall be changed: but Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail.  The children of Thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall be established for  ever;"(10))pointing out plainly what things they are that pass away, and who it is that doth endure  for ever God, together with His servants. And in like manner Esaias says: "Lift up your eyes to the  heavens, and look upon the earth beneath; for the heaven has been set together as smoke, and the  earth shall wax old like a garment, and they who dwell therein shall die in like manner. But my  salvation shall be for ever, and my righteousness shall not pass away."(11)

CHAP. IV.--ANSWER TO ANOTHER OBJECTION, SHOWING THAT THE DESTRUCTION  OF JERUSALEM, WHICH WAS THE CITY OF THE GREAT KING, DIMINISHED NOTHING  FROM THE SUPREME MAJESTY' AND POWER OF GOD, FOR THAT THIS DESTRUCTION  WAS PUT IN EXECUTION BY THE MOST WISE COUNSEL OF THE SAME GOD.

1. Further, also, concerning Jerusalem and the Lord, they venture to assert that, if it had been  "the city of the great King,"(12) it would not have been deserted.(13) This is just as if any one  should say, that if straw were a creation of God, it would never part company with the wheat; and  that the vine twigs, if made by God, never would be lopped away and deprived of the clusters. But  as these [vine twigs] have not been originally made for their own sake, but for that of the fruit  growing upon them, which being come to maturity and taken away, they are left behind, and those  which do not conduce to fructification are lopped off altogether; so also [was it with] Jerusalem,  which had in herself borne the yoke of bondage (under which man was reduced, who in former  times was not subject to God when death was reigning, and being subdued, became a fit subject for  liberty), when the fruit of liberty had come, and reached maturity, and been reaped and stored in  the barn, and when those which had the power to produce fruit had been carried away from her  [i.e., from Jerusalem], and scattered throughout all the world. Even as Esaias saith, "The children  of Jacob shall strike root, and Israel shall flourish, and the whole world shall be filled with his  fruit."(1) The fruit, therefore, having been sown throughout all the world, she (Jerusalem) was  deservedly forsaken, and those things which had formerly brought forth fruit abundantly were  taken away; for from these, according to the flesh, were Christ and the apostles enabled to bring  forth fruit. But now these are no longer useful for bringing forth fruit. For all things which have a  beginning in time must of course have an end in time also.

2. Since, then, the law originated with Moses, it terminated with John as a necessary  consequence. Christ had come to fulfil it: wherefore "the law and the prophets were" with them  "until John."(2) And therefore Jerusalem, taking its commencement from David,(3) and fulfilling  its own times, must have an end of legislation(4) when the new covenant was revealed. For God  does all things by measure and in order; nothing is unmeasured with Him, because nothing is out  of order. Well spake he, who said that the unmeasurable Father was Himself subjected to measure  in the Son; for the Son is the measure of the Father, since He also comprehends Him. But that the  administration of them (the Jews) was temporary, Esaias says: "And the daughter of Zion shall be  left as a cottage in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers."(5) And when shall these  things be left behind? Is it not when the fruit shall be taken away, and the leaves alone shall be left,  which now have no power of producing fruit?

3. But why do we speak of Jerusalem, since, indeed, the fashion of the whole world must also  pass away, when the time of its disappearance has come, in order that the fruit indeed may be  gathered into the garner, but the chaff, left behind, may be consumed by fire? "For the day of the  Lord cometh as a burning furnace, and all sinners shall be stubble, they who do evil things, and the  day shall burn them up."(6) Now, who this Lord is that brings such a day about, John the Baptist  points out, when he says of Christ, "He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire, having  His fan in His hand to cleanse His floor; and He will gather His fruit into the garner, but the chaff  He will burn up with unquenchable fire."(7) For He who makes the chaff and He who makes the  wheat are not different persons, but one and the same, who judges them, that is, separates them.  But the wheat and the chaff, being inanimate and irrational, have been made such by nature. But  man, being endowed with reason, and in this respect like to God, having been made free in his will,  and with power over himself, is himself the cause to himself, that sometimes he becomes wheat,  and sometimes chaff. Wherefore also he shall be justly condemned, because, having been created a  rational being, he lost the true rationality, and living irrationally, opposed the righteousness of  God, giving himself over to every earthly spirit, and serving all lusts; as says the prophet, "Man,  being in honour, did not understand: he was assimilated to senseless beasts, and made like to  them."(8)

CHAP. V.--THE AUTHOR RETURNS TO HIS FORMER ARGUMENT, AND SHOWS THAT  THERE WAS BUT ONE GOD ANNOUNCED BY THE LAW AND PROPHETS, WHOM  CHRIST CONFESSES AS HIS FATHER, AND WHO, THROUGH HIS WORD, ONE LIVING  GOD WITH HIM, MADE HIMSELF KNOWN TO MEN IN BOTH COVENANTS.

1. God, therefore, is one and the same, who rolls up the heaven as a book, and renews the face of  the earth; who made the things of time. for man, so that coming to maturity in them, he may  produce the fruit of immortality; and who, through His kindness, also bestows [upon him] eternal  things, "that in the ages to come He may show the exceeding riches of His grace;"(9) who was  announced by the law and the prophets, whom Christ confessed as His Father. Now He is the  Creator, and He it is who is God over all, as Esaias says, "I am witness, saith the LORD God, and  my servant whom I have chosen, that ye may know, and believe, and understand that I AM. Before  me there was no other God, neither shall be after me. I am God, and besides me there is no  Saviour. I have proclaimed, and I have saved."(10) And again: "I myself am the first God, and I am  above things to come."(11) For neither in an ambiguous, nor arrogant, nor boastful manner, does  He say these things; but since it was impossible, without God, to come to a knowledge of God, He  teaches men, through His Word, to know God. To those, therefore, who are ignorant of these  matters, and on this account imagine that they have discovered another Father, justly does one say,  "Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God."(12)

2. For our Lord and Master, in the answer which He gave to the Sadducees, who say that there  is no resurrection, and who do therefore dishonour God, and lower the credit of the law, did both  indicate a resurrection, and reveal God, saying to them, "Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor  the power of God." "For, touching the resurrection of the dead," He says, "have ye not read that  which was spoken by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of  Jacob?(1) And He added, "He is not the God of the dead, but of the living; for all live to Him." By  these arguments He unquestionably made it clear, that He who spake to Moses out of the bush, and  declared Himself to be the God of the fathers, He is the God of the living. For who is the God of the  living unless He who is God, and above whom there is no other God? Whom also Daniel the  prophet, when Cyrus king of the Persians said to him, "Why dost thou not worship Bel?"(2) did  proclaim, saying, "Because I do not worship idols made with hands, but the living God, who  established the heaven and the earth and has dominion over all flesh." Again did he say, "I will  adore the Lord my God, because He is the living God." He, then, who was adored by the prophets  as the living God, He is the God of the living; and His Word is He who also spake to Moses, who  also put the Sadducees to silence, who also bestowed the gift of resurrection, thus revealing [both]  truths to those who are blind, that is, the resurrection and God [in His true character]. For if He be  not the God of the dead, but of the living, yet was called the God of the fathers who were sleeping,  they do indubitably live to God, and have not passed out of existence, since they are children of the  resurrection. But our Lord is Himself the resurrection, as He does Himself declare, "I am the  resurrection and the life."(3) But the fathers are His children; for it is said by the prophet: "Instead  of thy fathers, thy children have been made to thee."(4) Christ Himself, therefore, together with the  Father, is the God of the living, who spake to Moses, and who was also manifested to the fathers.

3. And teaching this very thing, He said to the Jews: "Your father Abraham rejoiced that he  should see my day; and he saw it, and was glad"(5) What is intended? "Abraham believed God, and  it was imputed unto him for righteousness."(6) In the first place, [he believed] that He was the  maker of heaven and earth, the only God; and in the next place, that He would make his seed as the  stars of heaven. This is what is meant by Paul, [when he says,] "as lights in the world."(7)  Righteously, therefore, having left his earthly kindred, he followed the Word of God, walking as a  pilgrim with the Word, that he might [afterwards] have his abode with the Word.

4. Righteously also the apostles, being of the race of Abraham, left the ship and their father, and  followed the Word. Righteously also do we, possessing the same faith as Abraham, and taking up  the cross as Isaac did the wood? follow Him. For in Abraham man had learned beforehand, and  had been accustomed to follow the Word of God. For Abraham, according to his faith, followed the  command of the Word of God, and with a ready mind delivered up, as a sacrifice to God, his only- begotten and beloved son, in order that God also might be pleased to offer up for all his seed His  own beloved and only-begotten Son, as a sacrifice for our redemption.

5. Since, therefore, Abraham was a prophet and saw in the Spirit the day of the Lord's coming,  and the dispensation of His suffering, through whom both he himself and all who, following the  example of his faith, trust in God, should be saved, he rejoiced exceedingly. The Lord, therefore,  was not unknown to Abraham, whose day he desired to see;(9) nor, again, was the Lord's Father,  for he had learned from the Word of the Lord, and believed Him; wherefore it was accounted to  him by the Lord for righteousness. For faith towards God justifies a man; and therefore he said, "I  will stretch forth my hand to the most high God, who made the heaven and the earth."(10) All  these truths, however, do those holding perverse opinions endeavour to overthrow, because of one  passage, which they certainly do not understand correctly.

CHAP. VI.--EXPLANATION OF THE WORDS OF CHRIST, "NO MAN KNOWETH THE  FATHER, BUT THE SON," ETC.; WHICH WORDS THE HERETICS MISINTERPRET. PROOF  THAT, BY THE FATHER REVEALING THE SON, AND BY THE SON BEING REVEALED,  THE FATHER WAS NEVER UNKNOWN.

1. For the Lord, revealing Himself to His disciples, that He Himself is the Word, who imparts  knowledge of the Father, and reproving the Jews, who imagined that they, had [the knowledge of]  God, while they nevertheless rejected His Word, through whom God is made known, declared,  "No man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and  he to whom the Son has willed to reveal [Him]."(11) Thus hath Matthew set it down, and Luke in  like manner, and Mark(1) the very same; for John omits this passage. They, however, who would  be wiser than the apostles, write [the verse] in the following manner: "No man knew the Father,  but the Son; nor the Son, but the Father, and he to whom the Son has willed to reveal [Him];" and  they explain it as if the true God were known to none prior to our Lord's advent; and that God who  was announced by the prophets, they allege not to be the Father of Christ.

a. But if Christ did then [only] begin to have existence when He came [into the world] as man,  and [if] the Father did remember [only] in the times of Tiberius Caesar to provide for [the wants of]  men, and His Word was shown to have not always coexisted with His creatures; [it may be  remarked that] neither then was it necessary that another God should be proclaimed, but [rather]  that the reasons for so great carelessness and neglect on His part should be made the subject of  investigation. For it is fitting that no such question should arise, and gather such strength, that it  would indeed both change God, and destroy our faith in that Creator who supports us by means of  His creation. For as we do direct our faith towards the Son, so also should we possess a firm and  immoveable love towards the Father. In his book against Marcion, Justin(2) does well say: "I would  not have believed the Lord Himself, if He had announced any other than He who is our framer,  maker, and nourisher. But because the only-begotten Son came to us from the one God, who both  made this world and formed us, and contains and administers all things, summing up His own  handiwork in Himself, my faith towards Him is steadfast, and my love to the Father immoveable,  God bestowing both upon us."

3. For no one can know the Father, unless through the Word of God, that is, unless by the Son  revealing [Him]; neither can he have knowledge of the Son, unless through the good pleasure of  the Father. But the Son performs the good pleasure of the Father; for the Father sends, and the Son  is sent, and comes. And His Word knows that His Father is, as far as regards us, invisible and  infinite; and since He cannot be declared [by any one else], He does Himself declare Him to us;  and, on the other hand, it is the Father alone who knows His own Word. And both these truths has  our Lord declared. Wherefore the Son reveals the knowledge of the Father through His own  manifestation. For the manifestation of the Son is the knowledge of the Father; for all things are  manifested through the Word. In order, therefore, that we might know that the Son who came is He  who imparts to those believing on Him a knowledge of the Father, He said to His disciples:(3) "No  man knoweth the Son but the Father, nor the Father but the Son, and those to whomsoever the Son  shall reveal Him;" thus setting Himself forth and the Father as He [really] is, that we may not  receive any other Father, except Him who is revealed by the Son.

4. But this [Father] is the Maker of heaven and earth, as is shown from His words; and not he,  the false father, who has been invented by Marcion, or by Valentinus, or by Basilides, or by  Carpocrates, or by Simon, or by the rest of the "Gnostics," falsely so called. For none of these was  the Son of God; but Christ Jesus our Lord [was], against whom they set their teaching in  opposition, and have the daring to preach an unknown God. But they ought to hear [this] against  themselves: How is it that He is unknown, who is known by them? for, whatever is known even by  a few, is not unknown. But the Lord did not say that both the Father and the Son could not be  known at all (in tatum), for in that case His advent would have been superfluous. For why did He  come hither? Was it that He should say to us, "Never mind seeking after God; for He is unknown,  and ye shall not find Him;" as also the disciples of Valentinus falsely declare that Christ said to  their AEons? But this is indeed vain. For the Lord taught us that no man is capable of knowing  God, unless he be taught of God; that is, that God cannot be known without God: but that this is  the express will of the Father, that God should be known. For they shall know(4) Him to  whomsoever the Son has revealed Him.

5. And for this purpose did the Father reveal the Son, that through His instrumentality He might  be manifested to all, and might receive those righteous ones who believe in Him into incorruption  and everlasting enjoyment (now, to believe in Him is to do His will); but He shall righteously shut  out into the darkness which they have chosen for themselves, those who do not believe, and who do  consequently avoid His light. The Father therefore has revealed Himself to all, by making His  Word visible to all; and, conversely, the Word has declared to all the Father and the Son, since He  has become visible to all. And therefore the righteous judgment of God [shall fall] upon all who,  like others, have seen, but have not, like others, believed.

6. For by means of the creation itself, the Word reveals God the Creator; and by means of the  world [does He declare] the Lord the Maker of the world; and by means of the formation [of man]  the Artificer who formed him; and by the Son that Father who begat the Son: and these things do  indeed address all men in the same manner, but all do not in the same way believe them. But by the  law and the prophets did the Word preach both Himself and the Father alike [to all]; and all the  people heard Him alike, but all did not alike believe. And through the Word Himself who had been  made visible and palpable, was the Father shown forth, although all did not equally believe in Him;  but all saw the Father in the Son: for the Father is the invisible of the Son, but the Son the visible  of the Father. And for this reason all spake with Christ when He was present [upon earth], and they  named Him God. Yea, even the demons exclaimed, on beholding the Son: "We know Thee who  Thou art, the Holy One of God."' And the devil looking at Him, and tempting Him, said: "If Thou  art the Son of God;"(2)--all thus indeed seeing and speaking of the Son and the Father, but all not  believing [in them].

7. For it was fitting that the truth should receive testimony from all, and should become [a  means of] judgment for the salvation indeed of those who believe, but for the condemnation of  those who believe not; that all should be fairly judged, and that the faith in the Father and Son  should be approved by all, that is, that it should be established by all [as the one means of  salvation], receiving testimony from all, both from those belonging to it, since they are its friends,  and by those having no connection with it, though they are its enemies. For that evidence is true,  and cannot be gainsaid, which elicits even from its adversaries striking a testimonies in its behalf;  they being convinced with respect to the matter in hand by their own plain contemplation of it, and  bearing testimony to it, as well as declaring it.(4) But after a while they break forth into enmity,  and become accusers [of what they had approved], and are desirous that their own testimony should  not be [regarded as] true. He, therefore, who was known, was not a different being from Him who  declared "No man knoweth the Father," but one and the same, the Father making all things subject  to Him; while He received testimony from all that He was very man, and that He was very God,  from the Father, from the Spirit, from angels, from the creation itself, from men, from apostate  spirits and demons, from the enemy, and last of all, from death itself. But the Son, administering  all things for the Father, works from the beginning even to the end, and without Him no man can  attain the knowledge of God.

For the Son is the knowledge of the Father; but the knowledge of the  Son is in the Father, and has been revealed through the Son; and this was the reason why the Lord  declared: "No man knoweth the Son, but the Father; nor the Father, save the Son, and those to  whomsoever the Son shall reveal [Him]."(5) For "shall reveal" was said not with reference to the  future alone, as if then [only] the Word had begun to manifest the Father when He was born of  Mary, but it applies indifferently throughout all time. For the Son, being present with His own  handiwork from the beginning, reveals the Father to all; to whom He wills, and when He wills, and  as the Father wills. Wherefore, then, in all things, and through all things, there is one God, the  Father, and one Word, and one Son, and one Spirit, and one salvation to all who believe in Him.

CHAP. VII.--RECAPITULATION OF THE FOREGOING ARGUMENT, SHOWING THAT  ABRAHAM, THROUGH THE REVELATION OF THE WORD, KNEW THE FATHER, AND  THE COMING OF THE SON OF GOD. FOR THIS CAUSE, HE REJOICED TO SEE THE DAY  OF CHRIST, WHEN THE PROMISES MADE TO HIM SHOULD BE FULFILLED. THE FRUIT  OF THIS REJOICING HAS FLOWED TO POSTERITY, VIZ., TO THOSE WHO ARE  PARTAKERS IN THE FAITH OF ABRAHAM, BUT NOT TO THE JEWS WHO REJECT THE  WORD OF GOD.

1. Therefore Abraham also, knowing the. Father through the Word, who made heaven and  earth, confessed Him to be God; and having learned, by an announcement [made to him], that the  Son of God would be a man among men, by whose advent his seed should be as the stars of heaven,  he desired to see that day, so that he might himself also embrace Christ; and, seeing it through the  spirit of prophecy, he rejoiced.(6) Wherefore Simeon also, one of his descendants, carried fully out  the rejoicing of the patriarch, and said: "Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace. For  mine eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all people: a light  for the revelation of the Gentiles,(1) and the glory of the people Israel."(2) And the angels, in like  manner, announced tidings of great joy to the shepherds who were keeping watch by night.(3)  Moreover, Mary said, "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my  salvation;"(4)--the rejoicing of Abraham descending upon those who sprang from him,--those,  namely, who were watching, and who beheld Christ, and believed in Him; while, on the other  hand, there was a reciprocal rejoicing which passed backwards from the children to Abraham, who  did also desire to see the day of Christ's coming. Rightly, then, did our Lord bear witness to him,  saying, "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day; and he saw it, and was glad."

2. For not alone upon Abraham's account did He say these things, but also that He might point  out how all who have known God from the beginning, and have foretold the advent of Christ, have  received the revelation from the Son Himself; who also in the last times was made visible and  passable, and spake with the human race, that He might from the stones raise up children unto  Abraham, and fulfil the promise which God had given him, and that He might make his seed as the  stars of heaven,(5) as John the Baptist says: "For God is able from these stones to raise up children  unto Abraham."(6) Now, this Jesus did by drawing us off from the religion of stones, and bringing  us over from hard and fruitless cogitations, and establishing in us a faith like to Abraham. As Paul  does also testify, saying that we are children of Abraham because of the similarity of our faith, and  the promise of inheritance.(7)

3. He is therefore one and the same God, who called Abraham and gave him the promise. But He  is the Creator, who does also through Christ prepare lights in the world, [namely] those who  believe from among the Gentiles. And He says, "Ye are the light of the world;"(8) that is, as the  stars of heaven. Him, therefore, I have rightly shown to be known by no man, unless by the Son,  and to whomsoever the Son shall reveal Him. But the Son reveals the Father to all to whom He  wills that He should be known; and neither without the goodwill of the Father nor without the  agency of the Son, can any man know God. Wherefore did the Lord say to His disciples, "I am the  way, the truth, and the life and no man cometh unto the Father but by Me. If ye had known Me, ye  would have known My Father also: and from henceforth ye have both known Him, and have seen  Him."(9) From these words it is evident, that He is known by the Son, that is, by the Word.

4. Therefore have the Jews departed from God, in not receiving His Word, but imagining that  they could know the Father [apart] by Himself, without the Word, that is, without the Son; they  being ignorant of that God who spake in human shape to Abraham,(10) and again to Moses,  saying, "I have surely seen the affliction of My people in Egypt, and I have come down to deliver  them."(11) For the Son, who is the Word of God, arranged these things beforehand from the  beginning, the Father being in no want of angels, in order that He might call the creation into  being, and form man, for whom also the creation was made; nor, again, standing in need of any  instrumentality for the framing of created things, or for the ordering of those things which had  reference to man; while, [at the same time,] He has a vast and unspeakable number of servants. For  His offspring and His similitude(12) do minister to Him in every respect; that is, the Son and the  Holy Spirit, the Word and Wisdom; whom all the angels serve, and to whom they are subject. Vain,  therefore, ark those who, because of that declaration, "No man knoweth the Father, but the  Son,"(13) do introduce another unknown Father.

CHAP. VIII.--VAIN AttEMPTS OF MARCION AND HIS FOLLOWERS, WHO EXCLUDE  ABRAHAM FROM THE SALVATION BESTOWED BY CHRIST, WHO LIBERATED NOT  ONLY ABRAHAM, BUT THE SEED OF ABRAHAM, BY FULFILLING AND NOT  DESTROYING THE LAW WHEN HE HEALED ON THE SABBATH-DAY.

1. Vain, too, is [the effort of] Marcion and his followers when they [seek to] exclude Abraham  from the inheritance, to whom the Spirit through many men, and now by Paul, bears witness, that  "he believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness."(14) And the Lord [also bears  witness to him,] in the first place, indeed, by raising up children to him from the stones, and  making his seed as the stars of heaven, saying, "They shall come from the east and from the west,  from the north and from the south, and shall recline with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the  kingdom of heaven;"(15) and then again by saying to the Jews, "When ye shall see Abraham, and  Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets in the kingdom of heaven, but you yourselves cast out."(1)  This, then, is a clear point, that those who disallow his salvation, and frame the idea of another  God besides Him who made the promise to Abraham, are outside the kingdom of God, and are  disinherited from [the gift of] incorruption, setting at naught and blaspheming God, who  introduces, through Jesus Christ, Abraham to the kingdom of heaven, and his seed, that is, the  Church, upon which also is conferred the adoption and the inheritance promised to Abraham.

2. For the Lord vindicated Abraham's posterity by loosing them from bondage and calling them  to salvation, as He did in the case of the woman whom He healed, saying openly to those who had  not faith like Abraham, "Ye hypocrites,(2) doth not each one of you on the Sabbath-days loose his  ox or his ass, and lead him away to watering? And ought not this woman, being a daughter of  Abraham, whom Satan hath bound these eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath- days?"(3) It is clear therefore, that He loosed and vivified those who believe in Him as Abraham  did, doing nothing contrary to the law when He healed upon the Sabbath-day. For the law did not  prohibit men from being healed upon the Sabbaths; [on the contrary,] it even circumcised them  upon that day, and gave command that the offices should be performed by the priests for the  people; yea, it did not disallow the healing even of dumb animals. Both at Siloam and on frequent  subsequent(4) occasions, did He perform cures upon the Sabbath; and for this reason many used to  resort to Him on the Sabbath-days. For the law commanded them to abstain from every servile  work, that is, from all grasping after wealth which is procured by trading and by other worldly  business; but it exhorted them to attend to the exercises of the soul, which consist in reflection, and  to addresses of a beneficial kind for their neighbours' benefit. And therefore the Lord reproved  those who unjustly blamed Him for having healed upon the Sabbath-days. For He did not make  void, but fulfilled the law, by performing the offices of the high priest, propitiating God for men,  and cleansing the lepers, healing the sick, and Himself suffering death, that exiled man might go  forth from condemnation, and might return without fear to his own inheritance.

3. And again, the law did not forbid those who were hungry on the Sabbath-days to take food  lying ready at hand: it did, however, forbid them to reap and to gather into the barn. And therefore  did the Lord say to those who were blaming His disciples because they plucked and ate the ears of  corn, rubbing them in their hands, "Have ye not read this, what David did, when himself was an  hungered; how he went into the house of God, and ate the shew-bread, and gave to those who were  with him; which it is not lawful to eat, but for the priests alone?"(5) justifying His disciples by the  words of the law, and pointing out that it was lawful for the priests to act freely. For David had  been appointed a priest by God, although Saul persecuted him. For all the righteous possess the  sacerdotal rank.(6)

And all the apostles of the Lord are priests, who do inherit here neither lands  nor houses, but serve God and the altar continually. Of whom Moses also says in Deuteronomy,  when blessing Levi, "Who said unto his father and to his mother, I have not known thee; neither  did he acknowledge his brethren, and he disinherited his own sons: he kept Thy commandments,  and observed Thy covenant."(7) But who are they that have left father and mother, and have said  adieu to all their neighbours, on account of the word of God and His covenant, unless the disciples  of the Lord? Of whom again Moses says, "They shall have no inheritance, for the Lord Himself is  their inheritance."(8) And again, "The priests the Levites shall have no part in the whole tribe of  Levi, nor substance with Israel; their substance is the offerings (fructifications) of the Lord: these  shall they eat."(9)

Wherefore also Paul says, "I do not seek after a gift, but I seek after fruit."(10)  To His disciples He said, who had a priesthood of the Lord,(11) to whom it was lawful when  hungry to eat the ears of corn,(12) "For the workman is worthy of his meat."(13) And the priests in  the temple profaned the Sabbath, and were blameless. Wherefore, then, were they blameless?  Because when in the temple they were not engaged in secular affairs, but in the service of the Lord,  fulfilling the law, but not going beyond it, as that man did, who of his own accord carded dry wood  into the camp of God, and was justly stoned to death.(14) "For every tree that bringeth not forth  good fruit shall be hewn down, and cast into the fire;"(15) and "whosoever shall defile the temple  of God, him shall God defile."(16)

CHAP. IX.--THERE IS BUT ONE AUTHOR, AND ONE END TO BOTH COVENANTS.

1. All things therefore are of one and the same substance, that is, from one and the same God; as  also the Lord says to the disciples "Therefore every scribe, which is instructed unto the kingdom of  heaven, is like unto a man that is an householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things  new and old."(1) He did not teach that he who brought forth the old was one, and he that brought  forth the new, another; but that they were one and the same. For the Lord is the good man of the  house, who rules the tire house of His Father; and who delivers a law suited both for slaves and  those who are as yet undisciplined; and gives fitting precepts to those that are free, and have been  justified by faith, as well as throws His own inheritance open to those that are sons.

And He called  His disciples "scribes" and "teachers of the kingdom of heaven;" of whom also He elsewhere says to  the Jews: "Behold, I send unto you wise men, and scribes, and teachers; and some of them ye shall  kill, and persecute from city to city."(2) Now, without contradiction, He means by those things  which are brought forth from the treasure new and old, the two covenants; the old, that giving of  the law which took place formerly; and He points out as the new, that manner of life required by  the Gospel, of which David says, "Sing unto the LORD a new song;"(3) and Esaias, "Sing unto the  LORD a new hymn. His beginning (initium), His name is glorified from the height of the earth:  they declare His powers in the isles."(4) And Jeremiah says: "Behold, I will make a new covenant,  not as I made with your fathers"(5) in Mount Horeb. But one and the same householder produced  both covenants, the Word of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, who spake with both Abraham and Moses,  and who has restored us anew to liberty, and has multiplied that grace which is from Himself.

2. He declares: "For in this place is One greater than the temple."(6) But [the words] greater and  less are not applied to those things which have nothing in common between themselves, and are of  an opposite nature, and mutually repugnant; but are used in the case of those of the same substance,  and which possess properties in common, but merely differ in number and size; such as water from  water, and light from light, and grace from grace. Greater, therefore, is that legislation which has  been given in order liberty than that given in order to bondage; and therefore it has also been  diffused, not throughout one nation [only], but over the whole world. For one and the same Lord,  who is greater than the temple, greater than Solomon, and greater than Jonah, confers gifts upon  men, that is, His own presence, and the resurrection from the dead; but He does not change God,  nor proclaim another Father, but that very same one, who always has more to measure out to those  of His household. And as their love towards God increases, He bestows more and greater [gifts]; as  also the Lord said to His disciples: "Ye shall see greater things than these."(7) And Paul declares:  "Not that I have already attained, or that I am justified, or already have been made perfect.

For we  know in part, and we prophesy in part; but when that which is perfect has come, the things which  are in part shall be done away."(8) As, therefore, when that which is perfect is come, we shall not  see another Father, but Him whom we now desire to see (for "blessed are the pure in heart: for they  shall see God"(9)); neither shall we look for another Christ and Son of God, but Him who [was  born] of the Virgin Mary, who also suffered, in whom too we trust, and whom we love; as Esaias  says: "And they shall say in that day, Behold our LORD God, in whom we have trusted, and we  have rejoiced in our salvation;"(10) and Peter says in his Epistle: "Whom, not seeing, ye love; in  whom, though now ye see Him not, ye have believed, ye shall rejoice with joy unspeakable;"(11)  neither do we receive another Holy Spirit, besides Him who is with us, and who cries, "Abba,  Father;"(12) and we shall make increase in the very same things [as now], and shall make  progress, so that no longer through a glass, or by means of enigmas, but face to face, we shall enjoy  the gifts of God;--so also now, receiving more than the temple, and more than Solomon, that is, the  advent of the Son of God, we have not been taught another God besides the Framer and the Maker  of all, who has been pointed out to us from the beginning; nor another Christ, the Son of God,  besides Him who was foretold by the prophets.

3. For the new covenant having been known and preached by the prophets, He who was to carry  it out according to the good pleasure of the Father was also preached; having been revealed to men  as God pleased; that they might always make progress through believing in Him, and by means of  the [successive] covenants, should gradually attain to perfect salvation.(1) For there is one salvation  and one God; but the precepts which form the man are numerous, and the steps which lead man to  God are not a few. It is allowable for an earthly and temporal king, though he is [but] a man, to  grant to his subjects greater advantages at times: shall not this then be lawful for God, since He is  [ever] the same, and is always willing to confer a greater [degree of] grace upon the human race,  and to honour continually with many gifts those who please Him? But if this be to make progress,  [namely,] to find out another Father besides Him who was preached from the beginning; and again,  besides him who is imagined to have been discovered in the second place, to find out a third other,- -then the progress of this man will consist in his also proceeding from a third to a fourth; and from  this, again, to another and another: and thus he who thinks that he is always making progress of  such a kind, will never rest in one God.

For, being driven away from Him who truly is [God], and  being turned backwards, he shall be for ever seeking, yet shall never find out God;(2) but shall  continually swim in an abyss without limits, unless, being converted by repentance, he return to the  place from which he had been cast out, confessing one God, the Father, the Creator, and believing  [in Him] who was declared by the law and the prophets, who was borne witness to by Christ, as He  did Himself declare to those who were accusing His disciples of not observing the tradition of the  elders: "Why do ye make void the law of God by reason of your tradition? For God said, Honour  thy father and mother; and, Whosoever curseth father or mother, let him die the death."(3) And  again, He says to them a second time: "And ye have made void the word of God(4) by reason of  your tradition;" Christ confessing in the plainest manner Him to be Father and God, who said in  the law, "Honour thy father and mother; that it may be well with thee."(5) For the true God did  confess the commandment of the law as the word of God, and called no one else God besides His  own Father.

CHAP. X. -- THE OLD TESTAMENT SCRIPTURES, AND THOSE WRITTEN BY MOSES IN  PARTICULAR, DO EVERYWHERE MAKE MENTION OF THE SON OF GOD, AND  FORETELL HIS ADVENT AND PASSION. FROM THIS FACT IT FOLLOWS THAT THEY  WERE INSPIRED BY ONE AND THE SAME GOD.

1. Wherefore also John does appropriately relate that the Lord said to the Jews: "Ye search the  Scriptures, in which ye think ye have eternal life; these are they which testify of me. And ye are not  willing to come unto Me, that ye may have life."(6) How therefore did the Scriptures testify of Him,  unless they were from one and the same Father, instructing men beforehand as to the advent of His  Son, and foretelling the salvation brought in by Him? "For if ye had believed Moses, ye would also  have believed Me; for he wrote of Me;"(7) [saying this,] no doubt, because the Son of God is  implanted everywhere throughout his writings: at one time, indeed, speaking with Abraham, when  about to eat with him; at another time with Noah, giving to him the dimensions [of the ark]; at  another; inquiring after Adam; at another, bringing down judgment upon the Sodomites; and  again, when He becomes visible,(8) and directs Jacob on his journey, and speaks with Moses from  the bush.(9) And it would be endless to recount [the occasions] upon which the Son of God is  shown forth by Moses.

Of the day of His passion, too, he was not ignorant; but foretold Him, after a  figurative manner, by the name given to the passover;(10) and at that very festival, which had been  proclaimed such a long time previously by Moses, did our Lord suffer, thus fulfilling the passover.  And he did not describe the day only, but the place also, and the time of day at which the sufferings  ceased,(11) and the sign of the setting of the sun, saying: "Thou mayest not sacrifice the passover  within any other of thy cities which the LORD God gives thee; but in the place which the LORD  thy God shall choose that His name be called on there, thou shalt sacrifice the passover at even,  towards the setting of the sun."(12)

2. And already he had also declared His advent, saying, "There shall not fail a chief in Judah,  nor a leader from his loins, until He come for whom it is laid up, and He is the hope of the nations;  binding His foal to the vine, and His ass's colt to the creeping ivy. He shall wash His stole in wine,  and His upper garment in the blood of the grape; His eyes shall be more joyous than wine,(1) and  His teeth whiter than milk."(2) For, let those who have the reputation of investigating everything,  inquire at what time a prince and leader failed out of Judah, and who is the hope of the nations,  who also is the vine, what was the ass's colt [referred to as] His, what the clothing, and what the  eyes, what the teeth, and what the wine, and thus let them investigate every one of the points  mentioned; and they shall find that there was none other announced than our Lord, Christ Jesus.  Wherefore Moses, when chiding the ingratitude of the people, said, "Ye infatuated people, and  unwise, do ye thus requite the LORD?"(3) And again, he indicates that He who from the beginning  founded and created them, the Word, who also redeems and vivifies us in the last times, is shown  as hanging on the tree, and they will not believe on Him. For he says, "And thy life shall be  hanging before thine eyes, and thou wilt not believe thy life."(4) And again, "Has not this same one  thy Father owned thee, and made thee, and created thee?"(5)

CHAP. XI. --THE OLD PROPHETS AND RIGHTEOUS MEN KNEW BEFOREHAND OF THE  ADVENT OF CHRIST, AND EARNESTLY DESIRED TO SEE AND HEAR HIM, HE  REVEALING HIMSELF IN THE SCRIPTURES BY THE HOLY GHOST, AND WITHOUT ANY  CHANGE IN HIMSELF, ENRICHING MEN DAY BY DAY WITH BENEFITS, BUT  CONFERRING THEM IN GREATER ABUNDANCE ON LATER THAN ON FORMER GENERATIONS.

1. But that it was not only the prophets and many righteous men, who, foreseeing through the  Holy Spirit His advent, prayed that they might attain to that period in which they should see their  Lord face to face, and hear His words, the Lord has made manifest, when He says to His disciples,  "Many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not  seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them."(6) In what way,  then, did they desire both to hear and to see, unless they had foreknowledge of His future advent?  But how could they have foreknown it, unless they had previously received foreknowledge from  Himself? And how do the Scriptures testify of Him, unless all things had ever been revealed and  shown to believers by one and the same God through the Word; He at one time conferring with His  creature, and at another pro-pounding His law; at one time, again, reproving, at another exhorting,  and then setting free His servant, and adopting him as a son (in filium); and, at the proper time,  bestowing an incorruptible inheritance, for the purpose of bringing man to perfection? For He  formed him for growth and increase, as the Scripture says: "Increase and multiply."(7)

2. And in this respect God differs from man, that God indeed makes, but man is made; and truly,  He who makes is always the same; but that which is made must receive both beginning, and  middle, and addition, and increase. And God does indeed create after a skilful manner, while, [as  regards] man, he is created skilfully. God also is truly perfect in all things, Himself equal and  similar to Himself, as He is all light, and all mind, and all substance, and the fount of all good; but  man receives advancement and increase towards God. For as God is always the same, so also man,  when found in God, shall always go on towards God. For neither does God at any time cease to  confer benefits upon, or to enrich man; nor does man ever cease from receiving the benefits, and  being enriched by God. For the receptacle of His goodness, and the instrument of His glorification,  is the man who is grateful to Him that made him; and again, the receptacle of His just judgment is  the ungrateful man, who both despises his Maker and is not subject to His Word; who has promised  that He will give very much to those always bringing forth fruit, and more [and more] to those who  have the Lord's money. "Well done," He says, "good and faithful servant: because thou hast been  faithful in little, I will appoint thee over many things; enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."(8) The  Lord Himself thus promises very much.

3. As, therefore, He has promised to give very much to those who do now bring forth fruit,  according to the gift of His grace, but not according to the changeableness of "knowledge;" for the  Lord remains the same, and the same Father is revealed; thus, therefore, has the one and the same  Lord granted, by means of His advent, a greater gift of grace to those of a later period, than what  He had granted to those under the Old Testament dispensation. For they indeed used to hear, by  means of [His] servants, that the King would come, and they rejoiced to a certain extent, inasmuch  as they hoped for His coming; but those who have beheld Him actually present, and have obtained  liberty, and been made partakers of His gifts, do possess a greater amount of grace, and a higher  degree of exultation, rejoicing because of the King's arrival: as also David says, "My soul shall  rejoice in the LORD; it shall be glad in His salvation."(1) And for this cause, upon His entrance  into Jerusalem, all those who were in the way(2) recognised David their king in His sorrow of soul,  and spread their garments for Him, and ornamented the way with green boughs, crying out with  great joy and gladness, "Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is He that cometh in the name of the  Lord: hosanna in the highest."(3)

But to the envious wicked stewards, who circumvented those  under them, and ruled over those that had no great intelligence,(4) and for this reason were  unwilling that the king should come, and who said to Him, "Hearest thou what these say?" did the  Lord reply, "Have ye never read, Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast Thou perfected  praise?"(5)--thus pointing out that what had been declared by David concerning the Son of God,  was accomplished in His own person; and indicating that they were indeed ignorant of the meaning  of the Scripture and the dispensation of God; but declaring that it was Himself who was announced  by the prophets as Christ, whose name is praised in all the earth, and who perfects praise to His  Father from the mouth of babes and sucklings; wherefore also His glory has been raised above the  heavens.

4. If, therefore, the self-same person is present who was announced by the prophets, our Lord  Jesus Christ, and if His advent has brought in a fuller [measure of] grace and greater gifts to those  who have received Him, it is plain that the Father also is Himself the same who was proclaimed by  the prophets, and that the Son, on His coming, did not spread the knowledge of another Father, but  of the same who was preached from the beginning; from whom also He has brought down liberty to  those who, in a lawful manner, and with a willing mind, and with all the heart, do Him service;  whereas to scoffers, and to those not subject to God, but who follow outward purifications for the  praise of men (which observances had been given as a type of future things, -- the law typifying, as  it were, certain things in a shadow, and delineating eternal things by temporal, celestial by  terrestrial), and to those who pretend that they do themselves observe more than what has been  prescribed, as if preferring their own zeal to God Himself, while within they are full of hypocrisy,  and covetousness, and all wickedness, -- [to such] has He assigned everlasting perdition by cutting  them off from life.

CHAP.XII.--IT CLEARLY APPEARS THAT THERE WAS BUT ONE AUTHOR OF BOTH THE  OLD AND  THE NEW LAW, FROM THE FACT THAT CHRIST CONDEMNED TRADITIONS AND  CUSTOMS REPUGNANT TO THE FORMER, WHILE HE CONFIRMED ITS MOST  IMPORTANT PRECEPTS, AND TAUGHT THAT HE WAS HIMSELF THE END OF THE  MOSAIC LAW.

1. For the tradition of the elders themselves, which they pretended to observe from the law, was  contrary to the law given by Moses. Wherefore also Esaias declares: "Thy dealers mix the wine  with water,"(6) showing that the elders were in the habit of mingling a watered tradition with the  simple command of God; that is, they set up a spurious law, and one contrary to the[true] law; as  also the Lord made plain, when He said to them, "Why do ye transgress the commandment of God,  for the sake of your tradition?"(7) For not only by actual transgression did they set the law of God  at nought, mingling the wine with water; but they also set up their own law in opposition to it,  which is termed, even to the present day, the pharisaical. In this [law] they suppress certain things,  add others, and interpret others, again, as they think proper, which their teachers use, each one in  particular; and desiring to uphold these traditions, they were unwilling to be subject to the law of  God, which prepares them for the coming of Christ. But they did even blame the Lord for healing  on the Sabbath-days, which, as I have already observed, the law did not prohibit. For they did  themselves, in one sense, perform acts of healing upon the Sabbath-day, when they circumcised a  man [on that day]; but they did not blame themselves for transgressing the command of God  through tradition and the aforesaid pharisaical law, and for not keeping the commandment of the  law, which is the love of God.

2. But that this is the first and greatest commandment, and that the next [has respect to love]  towards our neighbour, the Lord has taught, when He says that the entire law and the prophets  hang upon these two commandments. Moreover, He did not Himself bring down [from heaven] any  other commandment greater than this one, but renewed this very same one to His disciples, when  He enjoined them to love God with all their heart, and others as themselves. But if He had  descended from another Father, He never would have made use of the first and greatest  commandment of the law; but He would undoubtedly have endeavoured by all means to bring down  a greater one than this from the perfect Father, so as not to make use of that which had been given  by the God of the law. And Paul in like manner declares, "Love is the fulfilling of the law:"(1) and  [he declares] that when all other things have been destroyed, there shall remain "faith, hope, and  love; but the greatest of all is love;"(2) and that apart from the love of God, neither knowledge  avails anything,(3) nor the understanding of mysteries, nor faith, nor prophecy, but that without  love all are hollow and vain; moreover, that love makes man perfect; and that he who loves God is  perfect, both in this world and in that which is to come. For we do never cease from loving God;  but in proportion as we continue to contemplate Him, so much the more do we love Him.

3. As in the law, therefore, and in the Gospel [likewise], the first and greatest commandment is,  to love the Lord God with the whole heart, and then there follows a commandment like to it, to  love one's neighbour as one's self; the author of the law and the Gospel is shown to be one and the  same. For the precepts of an absolutely perfect life, since they are the same in each Testament, have  pointed out [to us] the same God, who certainly has promulgated particular laws adapted for each;  but the more prominent and the greatest [commandments], without which salvation cannot [be  attained], He has exhorted [us to observe] the same in both.

4. The Lord, too, does not do away with this [God], when He shows that the law was not derived  from another God, expressing Himself as follows to those who were being instructed by Him, to the  multitude and to His disciples: "The scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses' seat. All, therefore,  whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not ye after their works: for they say,  and do not. For they bind heavy burdens, and lay them upon men's shoulders; but they themselves  will not so much as move them with a finger."(4) He therefore did not throw blame upon that law  which was given by Moses, when He exhorted it to be observed, Jerusalem being as yet in safety;  but He did throw blame upon those persons, because they repeated indeed the words of the law, yet  were without love. And for this reason were they held as being unrighteous as respects God, and as  respects their neighbours. As also Isaiah says: "This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their  heart is far from Me: howbeit in vain do they worship Me, teaching the doctrines and the  commandments of men."(5) He does not call the law given by Moses commandments of men, but  the traditions of the eiders themselves which they had invented, and in upholding which they made  the law of God of none effect, and were on this account also not subject to His Word. For this is  what Paul says concerning these men: "For they, being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going  about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of  God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth."(6) And how is  Christ the end of the law, if He be not also the final Cause of it? For He who has brought in the end  has Himself also wrought the beginning; and it is He who does Himself say to Moses, "I have  surely seen the affliction of my people which is in Egypt, and I have come down to deliver  them;"(7) it being customary from the beginning with the Word of God to ascend and descend for  the purpose of saving those who were in affliction.

5. Now, that the law did beforehand teach mankind the necessity of following Christ, He does  Himself make manifest, when He replied as follows to him who asked Him what he should do that  he might inherit eternal life: "If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments."(8) But upon the  other asking "Which?"" again the Lord replies: "Do not commit adultery, do not kill, do not steal,  do not bear false witness, hon-our father and mother, and thou shalt love thy neighbour as  thyself,"--setting as an ascending series (velut gradus) before those who wished to follow Him, the  precepts of the law, as the entrance into life; and What He then said to one He said to all. But when  the former said, "All these have I done" (and most likely he had not kept them, for in that case the  Lord would not have said to him, "Keep the commandments"), the Lord, exposing his  covetousness, said to him, "If thou wilt be perfect, go, sell all that thou hast, and distribute to the  poor; and come, follow me;" promising to those who would act thus, the portion belonging to the  apostles (apostolorum partem). And He did not preach to His followers another God the Father,  besides Him who was proclaimed by the law from the beginning; nor another Son; nor the Mother,  the enthymesis of the AEon, who existed in suffering and apostasy; nor the Pleroma of the thirty  AEons, which has been proved vain, and incapable of being believed in; nor that fable invented by  the other heretics. But He taught that they should obey the commandments which God enjoined  from the beginning, and do away with their former covetousness by good works,(9) and follow after  Christ. But that possessions distributed to the poor do annul former covetousness, Zaccheus made  evident, when he said, "Behold, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have defrauded any  one, I restore fourfold."(1)

CHAP. XIII.--CHRIST DID NOT ABROGATE THE NATURAL PRECEPTS OF THE LAW,  BUT RATHER FULFILLED AND EXTENDED THEM. HE REMOVED THE YOKE AND  BONDAGE OF THE OLD LAW, SO THAT MANKIND, BEING NOW SET FREE, MIGHT  SERVE GOD WITH THAT TRUSTFUL PIETY WHICH BECOMETH SONS.

1. And that the Lord did not abrogate the natural [precepts] of the law, by which man(2) is  justified, which also those who were justified by faith, and who pleased God, did observe previous  to the giving of the law, but that He extended and fulfilled them, is shown from His words. "For,"  He remarks, "it has been said to them of old time, Do not commit adultery. But I say unto you, That  every one who hath looked upon a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her  already in his heart."(3) And again: "It has been said, Thou shalt not kill. But I say unto you, Every  one who is angry with his brother without a cause, shall be in danger of the judgment."(4) And, "It  hath been said, Thou shalt not forswear thyself. But I say unto you, Swear not at all; but let your  conversation be, Yea, yea, and Nay, nay."(5) And other statements of a like nature. For all these do  not contain or imply an opposition to and an overturning of the [precepts] of the past, as Marcion's  followers do strenuously maintain; but [they exhibit] a fulfilling and an extension of them, as He  does Himself declare: "Unless your righteousness shall exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees, ye  shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven."(6) For what meant the excess referred to? In the first  place, [we must] believe not only in the Father, but also in His Son now revealed; for He it is who  leads man into fellowship and unity with God. In the next place, [we must] not only say, but we  must do; for they said, but did not. And [we must] not only abstain from evil deeds, but even from  the desires after them. Now He did not teach us these things as being opposed to the law, but as  fulfilling the law, and implanting in us the varied righteousness of the law. That would have been  contrary to the law, if He had commanded His disciples to do anything which the law had  prohibited. But this which He did command--namely, not only to abstain from things forbidden by  the law, but even from longing after them--is not contrary to [the law], as I have remarked, neither  is it the utterance of one destroying the law, but of one fulfilling, extending, and affording greater  scope to it.

2. For the law, since it was laid down for those in bondage, used to instruct the soul by means of  those corporeal objects which were of an external nature, drawing it, as by a bond, to obey its  commandments, that man might learn to serve God. But the Word set free the soul, and taught that  through it the body should be willingly purified. Which having been accomplished, it followed as  of course, that the bonds of slavery should be removed, to which man had now become accustomed,  and that he should follow God without fetters: moreover, that the laws of liberty should be  extended, and subjection to the king increased, so that no one who is convened should appear  unworthy to Him who set him free, but that the piety and obedience due to the Master of the  household should be equally rendered both by servants and children; while the children possess  greater confidence [than the servants], inasmuch as the working of liberty is greater and more  glorious than that obedience which is rendered in [a state of] slavery.

3. And for this reason did the Lord, instead of that [commandment], "Thou shalt not commit  adultery," forbid even concupiscence; and instead of that which runs thus, "Thou shalt not kill," He  prohibited anger; and instead of the law enjoining the giving of tithes, [He told us] to share(7) all  our possessions with the poor; and not to love our neighbours only, but even our enemies; and not  merely to be liberal givers and bestowers, but even that we should present a gratuitous gift to those  who take away our goods. For "to him that taketh away thy coat," He says, "give to him thy cloak  also; and from him that taketh away thy goods, ask them not again; and as ye would that men  should do unto you, do ye unto them:"(8) so that we may not grieve as those who are unwilling to  be defrauded, but may rejoice as those who have given willingly, and as rather conferring a favour  upon our neighbours than yielding to necessity. "And if any one," He says, "shall compel thee [to  go] a mile, go with him twain;"(9) so that thou mayest not follow him as a slave, but may as a free  man go before him, showing thyself in all things kindly disposed and useful to thy neighbour, not  regarding their evil intentions, but performing thy kind offices, assimilating thyself to the Father,  "who maketh His sun to rise upon the evil and the good, and sendeth rain upon the just and  unjust."(1) Now all these [precepts], as I have already observed, were not the injunctions] of one  doing away with the law, but of one fulfilling, extending, and widening it among us; just as if one  should say, that the more extensive operation of liberty implies that a more complete subjection and  affection towards our Liberator had been implanted within us. For He did not set us free for this  purpose, that we should depart from Him (no one, indeed, while placed out of reach of the Lord's  benefits, has power to procure for himself the means of salvation), but that the more we receive His  grace, the more we should love Him. Now the more we have loved Him, the more glory shall we  receive from Him, when we are continually in the presence of the Father.  4. Inasmuch, then, as all natural precepts are common to us and to them (the Jews), they had in  them indeed the beginning and origin; but in us they have received growth and completion. For to  yield assent to God, and to follow His Word, and to love Him above all, and one's neighbour as  one's self (now man is neighbour to man), and to abstain from every evil deed, and all other things  of a like nature which are common to both [covenants], do reveal one and the same God. But this is  our Lord, the Word of God, who in the first instance certainly drew slaves to God, but afterwards  He set those free who were subject to Him, as He does Himself declare to His disciples: "I will not  now call you servants, for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth; but I have called you  friends, for all things which I have heard from My Father I have made known."(2) For in that  which He says, "I will not now call you servants," He indicates in the most marked manner that it  was Himself who did originally appoint for men that bondage with respect to God through the law,  and then afterwards conferred upon them freedom. And in that He says, "For the servant knoweth  not what his lord doeth," He points out, by means of His own advent, the ignorance of a people in a  servile condition. But when He terms His disciples "the friends of God," He plainly declares  Himself to be the Word of God, whom Abraham also followed voluntarily and under no  compulsion (sine vinculis), because of the noble nature of his faith, and so became "the friend of  God."(3) But the Word of God did not accept of the friendship of Abraham, as though He stood in  need of it, for He was perfect from the beginning ("Before Abraham was," He says, "I am"(4)), but  that He in His goodness might bestow eternal life upon Abraham himself, inasmuch as the  friendship of God imparts immortality to those who embrace it.

CHAP. XIV.--IF GOD DEMANDS OBEDIENCE FROM MAN, IF HE FORMED MAN, CALLED HIM AND PLACED HIM UNDER LAWS, IT WAS MERELY FOR MAN'S WELFARE; NOT THAT GOD STOOD IN NEED OF MAN, BUT THAT HE GRACIOUSLY  CONFERRED UPON MAN HIS FAVOURS IN EVERY POSSIBLE MANNER.

1. In the beginning, therefore, did God form Adam, not as if He stood in need of man, but that  He might have [some one] upon whom to confer His benefits. For not alone antecedently to Adam,  but also before all creation, the Word glorified His Father, remaining in Him; and was Himself  glorified by the Father, as He did Himself declare, "Father, glorify Thou Me with the glory which I  had with Thee before the world was."(5) Nor did He stand in need of our service when He ordered  us to follow Him; but He thus bestowed salvation upon ourselves. For to follow the Saviour is to be  a partaker of salvation, and to follow light is to receive light. But those who are in light do not  themselves illumine the light, but are illumined and revealed by it: they do certainly contribute  nothing to it, but, receiving the benefit, they are illumined by the light. Thus, also, service  [rendered] to God does indeed profit God nothing, nor has God need of human obedience; but He  grants to those who follow and serve Him life and in-corruption and eternal glory, bestowing  benefit upon those who serve [Him], because they do serve Him, and on His followers, because they  do follow Him; but does not receive any benefit from them: for He is rich, perfect, and in need of  nothing. But for this reason does God demand service from men, in order that, since He is good  and merciful, He may benefit those who continue in His service. For, as much as God is in want of  nothing, so much does man stand in need of fellowship with God. For this is the glory of man, to  continue and remain permanently in God's service. Wherefore also did the Lord say to His  disciples, "Ye have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you;"(6) indicating that they did not glorify  Him when they followed Him; but that, in following the Son of God, they were glorified by Him.  And again, "I will, that where I am, there they also may be, that they may behold My glory;"(7) not  vainly boasting because of this, but desiring that His disciples should share in His glory: of whom  Esaias also says, "I will bring thy seed from the east, and will gather thee from the west; and I will  say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not back: bring My sons from far, and My  daughters from the ends of the earth; all, as many as have been called in My name: for in My glory  I have prepared, and formed, and made him."(1) Inasmuch as then, "wheresoever the carcase is,  there shall also the eagles be gathered together,"(2) we do participate in the glory of the Lord, who  has both formed us, and prepared us for this, that, when we are with Him, we may partake of His  glory.

2. Thus it was, too, that God formed man at the first, because of His munificence; but chose the  patriarchs for the sake of their salvation; and prepared a people beforehand, teaching the  headstrong to follow God; and raised up prophets upon earth, accustoming man to bear His Spirit  [within him], and to hold communion with God: He Himself, indeed, having need of nothing, but  granting communion with Himself to those who stood in need of it, and sketching out, like an  architect, the plan of salvation to those that pleased Him. And He did Himself furnish guidance to  those who beheld Him not in Egypt, while to those who became unruly in the desert He  promulgated a law very suitable [to their condition]. Then, on the people who entered into the good  land He bestowed a noble inheritance; and He killed the fatted calf for those converted to the  Father, and presented them with the finest robe.(3) Thus, in a variety of ways, He adjusted the  human race to an agreement with salvation. On this account also does John declare in the  Apocalypse, "And His voice as the sound of many waters."(4) For the Spirit [of God] is truly [like]  many waters, since the Father is both rich and great. And the Word, passing through all those  [men], did liberally confer benefits upon His subjects, by drawing up in writing a law adapted and  applicable to every class [among them].

3. Thus, too, He imposed upon the [Jewish] people the construction of the tabernacle, the  building of the temple, the election of the Levites, sacrifices also, and oblations, legal monitions,  and all the other service of the law. He does Himself truly want none of these things, for He is  always full of all good, and had in Himself all the odour of kindness, and every perfume of sweet- smelling savours, even before Moses existed. Moreover, He instructed the people, who were prone  to turn to idols, instructing them by repeated appeals to persevere and to serve God, calling them to  the things of primary importance by means of those which were secondary; that is, to things that  are real, by means of those that are typical; and by things temporal, to eternal; and by the carnal to  the spiritual; and by the earthly to the heavenly; as was also said to Moses, "Thou shalt make all  things after the pattern of those things which thou sawest in the mount."(5) For during forty days  He was learning to keep [in his memory] the words of God, and the celestial patterns, and the  spiritual images, and the types of things to come; as also Paul says: "For they drank of the rock  which followed them: and the rock was Christ."(6) And again, having first mentioned what are  contained in the law, he goes on to say: "Now all these things happened to them in a figure; but  they were written for our admonition, upon whom the end of the ages is come." For by means of  types they learned to fear God, and to continue devoted to His service.

CHAP.XV.--AT FIRST GOD DEEMED IT SUFFICIENT TO INSCRIBE THE NATURAL LAW,  OR THE DECALOGUE, UPON THE HEARTS OF MEN; BUT AFTERWARDS HE FOUND IT  NECESSARY TO BRIDLE, WITH THE YOKE OF THE MOSAIC LAW, THE DESIRES OF  THE JEWS, WHO WERE ABUSING THEIR LIBERTY; AND EVEN TO ADD SOME SPECIAL  COMMANDS, BECAUSE OF THE HARDNESS OF THEIR HEARTS.

1. They (the Jews) had therefore a law, a course of discipline, and a prophecy of future things.  For God at the first, indeed, warning them by means of natural precepts, which from the beginning  He had implanted in mankind, that is, by means of the Decalogue (which, if any one does not  observe, he has no salvation), did then demand nothing more of them. As Moses says in  Deuteronomy, "These are all the words which the Lord spake to the whole assembly of the sons of  Israel on the mount, and He added no more; and He wrote them on two tables of stone, and gave  them to me."(7) For this reason [He did so], that they who are willing to follow Him might keep  these commandments. But when they turned themselves to make a calf, and had gone back in their  minds to Egypt, desiring to be slaves instead of free-men, they were placed for the future in a state  of servitude suited to their wish,--[a slavery] which did not indeed cut them off from God, but  subjected them to the yoke of bondage; as Ezekiel the prophet, when stating the reasons for the  giving of such a law, declares: "And their eyes were after the desire of their heart; and I gave them  statutes that were not good, and judgments in which they shall not live."(8)

Luke also has recorded that Stephen, who was the first elected into the diaconate by the apostles,(1)  and who was the first slain for the testimony of Christ, spoke regarding Moses as follows: "This  man did indeed receive the commandments of the living God to give to us, whom your fathers  would not obey, but thrust [Him from them], and in their hearts turned back again into Egypt,  saying unto Aaron, Make us gods to go before us; for we do not know what has happened to [this]  Moses, who led us from the land of Egypt. And they made a calf in those days, and offered  sacrifices to the idol, and were rejoicing in the works of their own hands. But God turned, and gave  them up to worship the hosts of heaven; as it is written in the book of the prophets:(2) O ye house  of Israel, have ye offered to Me sacrifices and oblations for forty years in the wilderness? And ye  took up the tabernacle of Moloch, and the star of the god Remphan,(3) figures which ye made to  worship them;"(4) pointing out plainly, that the law being such, was not given to them by another  God, but that, adapted to their condition of servitude, [it originated] from the very same [God as we  worship]. Wherefore also He says to Moses in Exodus: "I will send forth My angel before thee; for I  will not go up with thee, because thou art a stiff-necked people."(5)

2. And not only so, but the Lord also showed that certain precepts were enacted for them by  Moses, on account of their hardness [of heart], and because of their unwillingness to be obedient,  when, on their saying to Him, "Why then did Moses command to give a writing of divorcement,  and to send away a wife?" He said to them, "Because of the hardness of your hearts he permitted  these things to you; but from the beginning it was not so;"(6) thus exculpating Moses as a faithful  servant, but acknowledging one God, who from the beginning made male and female, and  reproving them as hard-hearted and disobedient. And therefore it was that they received from  Moses this law of divorcement, adapted to their hard nature. But why say I these things concerning  the Old Testament? For in the New also are the apostles found doing this very thing, on the ground  which has been mentioned, Paul plainly declaring, But these things I say, not the Lord."(7) And  again: "But this I speak by permission, not by commandment."(8) And again: "Now, as concerning  virgins, I have no commandment from the Lord; yet I give my judgment, as one that hath obtained  mercy of the Lord to be faithful."(9) But further, in another place he says: "That Satan tempt you  not for your incontinence."(10) If, therefore, even in the New Testament, the apostles are found  granting certain precepts in consideration of human infirmity, because of the incontinence of some,  lest such persons, having grown obdurate, and despairing altogether of their salvation, should  become apostates from God,--it ought not to be wondered at, if also in the Old Testament the same  God permitted similar indulgences for the benefit of His people, drawing them on by means of the  ordinances already mentioned, so that they might obtain the gift of salvation through them, while  they obeyed the Decalogue, and being restrained by Him, should not revert to idolatry, nor  apostatize from God, but learn to love Him with the whole heart. And if certain persons, because of  the disobedient and ruined Israelites, do assert that the giver (doctor) of the law was limited in  power, they will find in our dispensation, that "many are called, but few chosen;"(11) and that  there are those who inwardly are wolves, yet wear sheep's clothing in the eyes of the world (foris);  and that God has always preserved freedom, and the power of self-government in man,(12) while at  the same time He issued His own exhortations, in order that those who do not obey Him should be  righteously judged (condemned) because they have not obeyed Him; and that those who have  obeyed and believed on Him should be honoured with immortality.

CHAP. XVI.--PERFECT RIGHTEOUSNESS WAS CONFERRED NEITHER BY CIRCUMCISION NOR BY ANY OTHER LEGAL CEREMONIES. THE DECALOGUE, HOWEVER, WAS NOT CANCELLED BY CHRIST, BUT IS ALWAYS IN FORCE: MEN  WERE NEVER RELEASED FROM ITS COMMANDMENTS.

1. Moreover, we learn from the Scripture itself, that God gave circumcision, not as the completer  of righteousness, but as a sign, that the race of Abraham might continue recognisable. For it  declares: "God said unto Abraham, Every male among you shall be circumcised; and ye shall  circumcise the flesh of your foreskins, as a token of the covenant between Me and you."(13) This  same does Ezekiel the prophet say with regard to the Sabbaths: "Also I gave them My Sabbaths, to  be a sign between Me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord, that sanctify them."(14)  And in Exodus, God says to Moses: "And ye shall observe My Sabbaths; for it shall be a sign  between Me and you for your generations."(1) These things, then, were given for a sign; but the  signs were not unsymbolical, that is, neither unmeaning nor to no purpose, inasmuch as they were  given by a wise Artist; but the circumcision after the flesh typified that after the Spirit. For "we,"  says the apostle, "have been circumcised with the circumcision made without hands."(2) And the  prophet declares, "Circumcise the hardness of your heart."(3) But the Sabbaths taught that we  should continue day by day in God's service.(4) "For we have been counted," says the Apostle Paul,  "all the day long as sheep for the slaughter;"(5) that is, consecrated [to God], and ministering  continually to our faith, and persevering in it, and abstaining from all avarice, and not acquiring or  possessing treasures upon earth.(6) Moreover, the Sabbath of God (requietio Dei), that is, the  kingdom, was, as it were, indicated by created things; in which [kingdom], the man who shall have  persevered in serving God (Deo assistere) shall, in a state of rest, partake of God's table.

2. And that man was not justified by these things, but that they were given as a sign to the  people, this fact shows,--that Abraham himself, without circumcision and without observance of  Sabbaths, "believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness; and he was called the  friend of God."(7) Then, again, Lot, without circumcision, was brought out from Sodom, receiving  salvation from God. So also did Noah, pleasing God, although he was uncircumcised, receive the  dimensions [of the ark], of the world of the second race [of men]. Enoch, too, pleasing God,  without circumcision, discharged the office of God's legate to the angels although he was a man,  and was translated, and is preserved until now as a witness of the just judgment of God, because the  angels when they had transgressed fell to the earth for judgment, but the man who pleased [God]  was translated for salvation.(8) Moreover, all the rest of the multitude of those righteous men who  lived before Abraham, and of those patriarchs who preceded Moses, were justified independently of  the things above mentioned, and without the law of Moses. As also Moses himself says to the  people in Deuteronomy: "The LORD thy God formed a covenant in Horeb. The LORD formed not  this covenant with your fathers, but for you."(9)

3. Why, then, did the Lord not form the covenant for the fathers? Because "the law was not  established for righteous men."(10) But the righteous fathers had the meaning of the Decalogue  written in their hearts and souls,(11) that is, they loved the God who made them, and did no injury  to their neighbour. There was therefore no occasion that they should be cautioned by prohibitory  mandates (correptoriis literis),(12) because they had the righteousness of the law in themselves. But  when this righteousness and love to God had passed into oblivion, and became extinct in Egypt,  God did necessarily, because of His great goodwill to men, reveal Himself by a voice, and led the  people with power out of Egypt, in order that man might again become the disciple and follower of  God; and He afflicted those who were disobedient, that they should not contemn their Creator; and  He fed them with manna, that they might receive food for their souls (uti rationalem acciperent  escam); as also Moses says in Deuteronomy: "And fed thee with manna, which thy fathers did not  know, that thou mightest know that man cloth not live by bread alone; but by every word of God  proceeding out of His mouth doth man live."(13) And it enjoined love to God, and taught just  dealing towards our neighhour, that we should neither be unjust nor unworthy of God, who  prepares man for His friendship through the medium of the Decalogue, and likewise for agreement  with his neigbbour,--matters which did certainly profit man himself; God, however, standing in no  need of anything from man.

4. And therefore does the Scripture say, "These words the Lord spake to all the assembly of the  children of Israel in the mount, and He added no more;"(14) for, as I have already observed, He  stood in need of nothing from them. And again Moses says: "And now Israel, what cloth the LORD  thy God require of thee, but to fear the LORD thy God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him,  and to serve the LORD thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul?"(15) Now these things did  indeed make man glorious, by supplying what was wanting to him, namely, the friendship of God;  but they profited God nothing, for God did not at all stand in need of man's love. For the glory of  God was wanting to man, which he could obtain in no other way than by serving God. And  therefore Moses says to them again: "Choose life, that thou mayest live, and thy seed, to love the  LORD thy God, to hear His voice, to cleave unto Him; for this is thy life, and the length of thy  days."(1) Preparing man for this life, the Lord Himself did speak in His own person to all alike the  words of the Decalogue; and therefore, in like manner, do they remain permanently with us,(2)  receiving by means of His advent in the flesh, extension and increase, but not abrogation.

5. The laws of bondage, however, were one by one promulgated to the people by Moses, suited  for their instruction or for their punishment, as Moses himself declared: "And the LORD  commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and judgments."(3) These things, therefore, which  were given for bondage, and for a sign to them, He cancelled by the new covenant of liberty. But  He has increased and widened those laws which are natural, and noble, and common to all,  granting to men largely and without grudging, by means of adoption, to know God the Father, and  to love Him with the whole heart, and to follow His word unswervingly, while they abstain not only  from evil deeds, but even from the desire after them. But He has also increased the feeling of  reverence; for sons should have more veneration than slaves, and greater love for their father. And  therefore the Lord says, "As to every idle word that men have spoken, they shall render an account  for it in the day of judgment."(4) And, "he who has looked upon a woman to lust after her, hath  committed adultery with her already in his heart;"(5) and, "he that is angry with his brother  without a cause, shall be in danger of the judgment."(6) [All this is declared,] that we may know  that we shall give account to God not of deeds only, as slaves, but even of words and thoughts, as  those who have truly received the power of liberty, in which [condition] a man is more severely  tested, whether he will reverence, and fear, and love the Lord. And for this reason Peter says "that  we have not liberty as a cloak of maliciousness,"(7) but as the means of testing and evidencing  faith.

CHAP. XVII.--PROOF THAT GOD DID NOT APPOINT THE LEVITICAL DISPENSATION  FOR HIS OWN SAKE, OR AS REQUIRING SUCH SERVICE; FOR HE DOES, IN FACT, NEED  NOTHING FROM MEN.

1. Moreover, the prophets indicate in the fullest manner that God stood in no need of their  slavish obedience, but that it was upon their own account that He enjoined certain observances in  the law. And again, that God needed not their oblation, but [merely demanded it], on account of  man himself who offers it, the Lord taught distinctly, as I have pointed out. For when He perceived  them neglecting righteousness, and abstaining from the love of God, and imagining that God was  to be propitiated by sacrifices and the other typical observances, Samuel did even thus speak to  them: "God does not desire whole burnt-offerings and sacrifices, but He will have His voice to be  hearkened to. Behold, a ready obedience is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of  rams."(8) David also says: "Sacrifice and oblation Thou didst not desire, but mine ears hast Thou  perfected;(9) burnt-offerings also for sin Thou hast not required."(10) He thus teaches them that  God desires obedience, which renders them secure, rather than sacrifices and holocausts, which  avail them nothing towards righteousness; and [by this declaration] he prophesies the new  covenant at the same time. Still clearer, too, does he speak of these things in the fiftieth Psalm:  "For if Thou hadst desired sacrifice, then would I have given it: Thou wilt not delight in burnt- offerings. The .sacrifice of God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart the Lord will not  despise."(11) Because, therefore, God stands in need of nothing, He declares in the preceding  Psalm: "I will take no calves out of thine house, nor he-goats out of thy fold. For Mine are all the  beasts of the earth, the herds and the oxen on the mountains: I know all the fowls of heaven, and  the various tribes(12) of the field are Mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is  Mine, and the fulness thereof. Shall I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats?"(13) Then,  lest it might be supposed that He refused these things in His anger, He continues, giving him (man)  counsel: "Offer unto God the sacrifice of praise, and pay thy vows to the Most High; and call upon  Me in the day of thy trouble, and I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify Me;"(14) rejecting,  indeed, those things by which sinners imagined they could propitiate God, and showing that He  does Himself stand in need of nothing; but He exhorts and advises them to those things by which  man is justified and draws nigh to God. This same declaration does Esaias make: "To what purpose  is the multitude of your sacrifices unto Me? saith the Lord. I am full."(1) And when He had  repudiated holocausts, and sacrifices, and oblations, as likewise the new moons, and the sabbaths,  and the festivals, and all the rest of the services accompanying these, He continues, exhorting them  to what pertained to salvation: "Wash you, make you clean, take away wickedness from your hearts  from before mine eyes: cease from your evil ways, learn to do well, seek judgment, relieve the  oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow; and come, let us reason together, saith the  LORD."

2. For it was not because He was angry, like a man, as many venture to say, that He rejected  their sacrifices; but out of compassion to their blindness, and with the view of suggesting to them  the true sacrifice, by offering which they shall appease God, that they may receive life from Him.  As He elsewhere declares: "The sacrifice to God is an afflicted heart: a sweet savour to God is a  heart glorifying Him who formed it."(2) For if, when angry, He had repudiated these sacrifices of  theirs, as if they were persons unworthy to obtain His compassion, He would not certainly have  urged these same things upon them as those by which they might be saved. But inasmuch as God is  merciful, He did not cut them off from good counsel. For after He had said by Jeremiah, "To what  purpose bring ye Me incense from Saba, and cinnamon from a far country? Your whole burnt- offerings and sacrifices are not acceptable to Me;"(3) He proceeds: "Hear the word of the Lord, all  Judah. These things saith the LORD, the God of Israel, Make straight your ways and your doings,  and I will establish you in this place. Put not your trust in lying words, for they will not at all profit  you, saying, The temple of the LORD, The temple of the LORD, it is [here]."(4)

3. And again, when He points out that it was not for this that He led them out of Egypt, that they  might offer sacrifice to Him, but that, forgetting the idolatry of the Egyptians, they should be able  to hear the voice of the Lord, which was to them salvation and glory, He declares by this same  Jeremiah: "Thus saith the LORD; Collect together your burnt-offerings with your sacrifices and eat  flesh. For I spake not unto your fathers nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of  Egypt, concerning burnt-offerings or sacrifices: but this word I commanded them, saying, Hear My  voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be My people; and walk in all My ways whatsoever I  have commanded you, that it may be well with you. But they obeyed not, nor hearkened; but  walked in the imaginations of their own evil heart, and went backwards, and not forwards."(5) And  again, when He declares by the same man, "But let him that glorieth, glory in this, to understand  and know that I am the LORD, who doth exercise loving-kindness, and righteousness, and  judgment in the earth;"(6) He adds, "For in these things I delight, says the LORD," but not in  sacrifices, nor in holocausts, nor in oblations. For the people did not receive these precepts as of  primary importance (principaliter), but as secondary, and for the reason already alleged, as Isaiah  again says: "Thou hast not [brought to] Me the sheep of thy holocaust, nor in thy sacrifices hast  thou glorified Me: thou hast not served Me in sacrifices, nor in [the matter of] frankincense hast  thou done anything laboriously; neither hast thou bought for Me incense with money, nor have I  desired the fat of thy sacrifices; but thou hast stood before Me in thy sins and in thine  iniquities."(7) He says, therefore, "Upon this man will I look, even upon him that is humble, and  meek, and who trembles at My words."(8) "For the fat and the fat flesh shall not take away from  thee thine unrighteousness."(9) "This is the fast which I have chosen, saith the LORD. Loose every  band of wickedness, dissolve the connections of violent agreements, give rest to those that are  shaken, and cancel every unjust document. Deal thy bread to the hungry willingly, and lead into  thy house the roofless stranger. If thou hast seen the naked, cover him, and thou shalt not despise  those of thine own flesh and blood (domesticos seminis tui).

Then shall thy morning light break  forth, and thy health shall spring forth more speedily; and righteousness shall go before thee, and  the glory of the LoRD shall surround thee: and whilst thou an yet speaking, I will say, Behold, here  I am."(10) And Zechariah also, among the twelve prophets, pointing out to the people the will of  God, says: "These things does the LORD Omnipotent declare: Execute true judgment, and show  mercy and compassion each one to his brother. And oppress not the widow, and the orphan, and  the proselyte, and the poor; and let none imagine evil against your brother in his heart."(11) And  again, he says: "These are the words which ye shall utter. Speak ye the truth every man to his  neighbour, and execute peaceful judgment in your gates, and let none of you imagine evil in his  heart against his brother, and ye shall not love false swearing: for all these things I hate, saith the  LORD Almighty."(1) Moreover, David also says in like manner: "What man is there who desireth  life, and would fain see good days? Keep thy tongue from evil, and thy lips that they speak no  guile. Shun evil, and do good: seek peace, and pursue it."(2)

4. From all these it is evident that God did not seek sacrifices and holocausts from them, but  faith, and obedience, and righteousness, because of their salvation. As God, when teaching them  His will in Hosea the prophet, said, "I desire mercy rather than sacrifice, and the knowledge of God  more than burnt-offerings."(3) Besides, our Lord also exhorted them to the same effect, when He  said, "But if ye had known what [this] meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not  have condemned the guiltless."(4) Thus does He bear witness to the prophets, that they preached  the truth; but accuses these men (His hearers) of being foolish through their own fault.

5. Again, giving directions to His disciples to offer to God the first-fruits(5) of His own, created  things--not as if He stood in need of them, but that they might be themselves neither unfruitful nor  ungrateful--He took that created thing, bread, and gave thanks, and said, "This is My body."(6)  And the cup likewise, which is part of that creation to which we belong, He confessed to be His  blood, and taught the new oblation of the new covenant; which the Church receiving from the  apostles, offers to God throughout all the world, to Him who gives us as the means of subsistence  the first-fruits of His own gifts in the New Testament, concerning which Malachi, among the  twelve prophets, thus spoke beforehand: "I have no pleasure in you, saith the LORD Omnipotent,  and I will not accept sacrifice at your hands. For from the rising of the sun, unto the going down  [of the same], My name is glorified among the Gentiles, and in every place incense is offered to My  name, and a pure sacrifice; for great is My name among the Gentiles, saith the LORD  Omnipotent;"(7)--indicating in the plainest manner, by these words, that the former people [the  Jews] shall indeed cease to make offerings to God, but that in every place sacrifice shall be offered  to Him, and that a pure one; and His name is glorified among the Gentiles.(8)

6. But what other name is there which is glorified among the Gentiles than that of our Lord, by  whom the Father is glorified, and man also? And because it is [the name] of His own Son, who was  made man by Him, He calls it His own. Just as a king, if he himself paints a likeness of his son, is  right in calling this likeness his own, for both these reasons, because it is [the likeness] of his son,  and because it is his own production; so also does the Father confess the name of Jesus Christ,  which is throughout all the world glorified in the Church, to be His own, both because it is that of  His Son, and because He who thus describes it gave Him for the salvation of men. Since, therefore,  the name of the Son belongs to the Father, and since in the omnipotent God the Church makes  offerings through Jesus Christ, He says well on both these grounds, "And in every place incense is  offered to My name, and a pure sacrifice." Now John, in the Apocalypse, declares that the  "incense" is "the prayers of the saints."(9)

CHAP. XVIII.--CONCERNING SACRIFICES AND OBLATIONS, AND THOSE WHO TRULY  OFFER THEM.

1. The oblation of the Church, therefore, which the Lord gave instructions to be offered  throughout all the world, is accounted with God a pure sacrifice, and is acceptable to Him; not that  He stands in need of a sacrifice from us, but that he who offers is himself glorified in what he does  offer, if his gift be accepted. For by the gift both honour and affection are shown forth towards the  King; and the Lord, wishing us to offer it in all simplicity and innocence, did express Himself thus:  "Therefore, when thou offerest thy gift upon the altar, and shalt remember that thy brother hath  ought against thee, leave thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother,  and then return and offer thy gift."(10) We are bound, therefore, to offer to God the first-fruits of  His creation, as Moses also says, "Thou shalt not appear in the presence of the Lord thy God  empty;"(11) so that man, being accounted as grateful, by those things in which he has shown his  gratitude, may receive that honour which flows from Him.(12)

2. And the class of oblations in general has not been set aside; for there were both oblations there [among the Jews], and there are oblations here [among the Christians]. Sacrifices there were  among the people; sacrifices there are, too, in the Church: but the species alone has been changed,  inasmuch as the offering is now made, not by slaves, but by freemen. For the Lord is [ever] one and  the same; but the character of a servile oblation is peculiar [to itself], as is also that of freemen, in  order that, by the very oblations, the indication of liberty may be set forth. For with Him there is  nothing purposeless, nor without signification, nor without design. And for this reason they (the  Jews) had indeed the tithes of their goods consecrated to Him, but those who have received liberty  set aside all their possessions for the Lord's purposes, bestowing joyfully and freely not the less  valuable portions of their property, since they have the hope of better things [hereafter]; as that  poor widow acted who cast all her living into the treasury of God.(1)

3. For at the beginning God had respect to the gifts of Abel, because he offered with single- mindedness and righteousness; but He had no respect unto the offering of Cain, because his heart  was divided with envy and malice, which he cherished against his brother, as God says when  reproving his hidden [thoughts], "Though thou offerest rightly, yet, if thou dost not divide rightly,  hast thou not sinned? Be at rest;"(2)  since God is not appeased by sacrifice. For if any one shall endeavour to offer a sacrifice merely to  outward appearance, unexceptionably, in due order, and according to appointment, while in his  soul he does not assign to his neighbour that fellowship with him which is right and proper, nor is  under the fear of God;--he who thus cherishes secret sin does not deceive God by that sacrifice  which is offered correctly as to outward appearance; nor will such an oblation profit him anything,  but [only] the giving up of that evil which has been conceived within him, so that sin may not the  more, by means of the hypocritical action, render him the destroyer of himself.(3) Wherefore did  the Lord also declare: "Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye are like whited  sepulchres. For the sepulchre appears beautiful outside, but within it is full of dead men's bones,  and all uncleanness; even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of  wickedness and hypocrisy."(4) For while they were thought to offer correctly so far as outward  appearance went, they had in themselves jealousy like to Cain; therefore they slew the Just One,  slighting the counsel of the Word, as did also Cain. For [God] said to him, "Be at rest;" but he did  not assent. Now what else is it to "be at rest" than to forego purposed violence? And saying similar  things to these men, He declares: "Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse that which is within the cup, that  the outside may be clean also."(5) And they did not listen to Him. For Jeremiah says, "Behold,  neither thine eyes nor thy heart are good; but [they are turned] to thy covetousness, and to shed  innocent blood, and for injustice, and for man-slaying, that thou mayest do it."(6) And again Isaiah  saith, "Ye have taken counsel, but not of Me; and made covenants, [but] not by My Spirit."(7) In  order, therefore, that their inner wish and thought, being brought to light, may show that God is  without blame, and worketh no evil--that God who reveals what is hidden [in the heart], but who  worketh not evil--when Cain was by no means at rest, He saith to him: "To thee shall be his desire,  and thou shalt rule over him."(8) Thus did He in like manner speak to Pilate: "Thou shouldest have  no power at all against Me, unless it were given thee from above;"(9) God always giving up the  righteous one [in this life to suffering], that he, having been tested by what he suffered and  endured, may [at last] be accepted; but that the evildoer, being judged by the actions he has  performed, may be rejected. Sacrifices, therefore, do not sanctify a man, for God stands in no need  of sacrifice; but it is the conscience of the offerer that sanctifies the sacrifice when it is pure, and  thus moves God to accept [the offering] as from a friend. "But the sinner," says He, "who kills a  calf [in sacrifice] to Me, is as if he slew a dog."(10)

4. Inasmuch, then, as the Church offers with single-mindedness, her gift is justly reckoned a  pure sacrifice with God. As Paul also says to the Philippians, "I am full, having received from  Epaphroditus the things that were sent from you, the odour of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable,  pleasing to God."(11) For it behoves us to make an oblation to God, and in all things to be found  grateful to God our Maker, in a pure mind, and in faith without hypocrisy, in well-grounded hope,  in fervent love, offering the first-fruits of His own created things. And the Church alone offers this  pure oblation to the Creator, offering to Him, with giving of thanks, [the things taken] from His  creation. But the Jews do not offer thus: for their hands are full of blood; for they have not received  the Word, through whom it is offered to God.(1) Nor, again, do any of the conventicles (synagogoe)  of the heretics [offer this]. For some, by maintaining that the Father is different from the Creator,  do, when they offer to Him what belongs to this creation of ours, set Him forth as being covetous of  another's property, and desirous of what is not His own. Those, again, who maintain that the things  around us originated from apostasy, ignorance, and passion, do, while offering unto Him the fruits  of ignorance, passion, and apostasy, sin against their Father, rather subjecting Him to insult than  giving Him thanks. But how can they be consistent with themselves, [when they say] that the bread  over which thanks have been given is the body of their Lord,(2) and the cup His blood, if they do  not call Himself the Son of the Creator of the world, that is, His Word, through whom the wood  fructifies, and the fountains gush forth, and the earth gives "first the blade, then the ear, then the  full corn in the ear."(3)

5. Then, again, how can they say that the flesh, which is nourished with the body of the Lord  and with His blood, goes to corruption, and does not partake of life? Let them, therefore, either  alter their opinion, or cease from offering the things just mentioned.(4) But our opinion is in  accordance with the Eucharist, and the Eucharist in turn establishes our opinion. For we offer to  Him His own, announcing consistently the fellowship and union of the flesh and Spirit.(5) For as  the bread, which is produced from the earth, when it receives the invocation of God, is no longer  common bread,(6) but the Eucharist, consisting of two realities, earthly and heavenly; so also our  bodies, when they receive the Eucharist, are no longer corruptible, having the hope of the  resurrection to eternity.

6. Now we make offering to Him, not as though He stood in need of it, but rendering thanks for  His gift,(7) and thus sanctifying what has been created. For even as God does not need our  possessions, so do we need to offer something to God; as Solomon says: "He that hath pity upon the  poor, lendeth unto the Lord."(8) For God, who stands in need of nothing, takes our good works to  Himself for this purpose, that He may grant us a recompense of His own good things, as our Lord  says: "Come, ye blessed of My Father, receive the kingdom prepared for you. For I was an  hungered, and ye gave Me to eat: I was thirsty, and ye gave Me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took  Me in: naked, and ye clothed Me; sick, and ye visited Me; in prison, and ye came to Me."(9) As,  therefore, He does not stand in need of these [services], yet does desire that we should render them  for our own benefit, lest we be unfruitful; so did the Word give to the people that very precept as to  the making of oblations, although He stood in no need of them, that they might learn to serve God:  thus is it, therefore, also His will that we, too, should offer a gift at the altar, frequently and without  intermission. The altar, then, is in heaven(10) (for towards that place are our prayers and oblations  directed); the temple likewise [is there], as John says in the Apocalypse, "And the temple of God  was opened:"(11) the tabernacle also: "For, behold," He says, "the tabernacle of God, in which He  will dwell with men."

CHAP.XIX.--EARTHLY THINGS MAY BE THE TYPE OF HEAVENLY, BUT THE LATTER  CANNOT BE THE TYPES OF OTHERS STILL SUPERIOR AND UNKNOWN; NOR CAN WE,  WITHOUT ABSOLUTE MADNESS, MAINTAIN THAT GOD IS KNOWN TO US ONLY AS  THE TYPE OF A STILL UNKNOWN AND SUPERIOR BEING.

1. Now the gifts, oblations, and all the sacrifices, did the people receive in a figure, as was  shown to Moses in the mount, from one and the same God, whose name is now glorified in the  Church among all nations. But it is congruous that those earthly things, indeed, which are spread  all around us, should be types of the celestial, being [both], however, created by the same God. For  in no other way could He assimilate an image of spiritual things [to suit our comprehension]. But  to allege that those things which are super-celestial and spiritual, and, as far as we are concerned,  invisible and ineffable, are in their turn the types of celestial things and of another Pleroma, and [to  say] that God is the image of another Father, is to play the part both of wanderers from the truth,  and of absolutely foolish and stupid persons. For, as I have repeatedly shown, such persons will  find it necessary to be continually finding out types of types, and images of images, and will never  [be able to] fix their minds on one and the true God. For their imaginations range beyond God, they  having in their hearts surpassed the Master Himself, being indeed in idea elated and exalted above  [Him], but in reality turning away from the true God.

2. To these persons one may with justice say (as Scripture itself suggests), To what distance  above God do ye lift up your imaginations, O ye rashly elated men? Ye have heard "that the  heavens are meted out in the palm of [His] hand:"(1) tell me the measure, and recount the endless  multitude of cubits, explain to me the fulness, the breadth, the length, the height, the beginning  and end of the measurement,--things which the heart of man understands not, neither does it  comprehend them. For the heavenly treasuries are indeed great: God cannot be measured in the  heart, and incomprehensible is He in the mind; He who holds the earth in the hollow of His hand.  Who perceives the measure of His right hand? Who knoweth His finger? Or who doth understand  His hand,--that hand which measures immensity; that hand which, by its own measure, spreads out  the measure of the heavens, and which comprises in its hollow the earth with the abysses; which  contains in itself the breadth, and length, and the deep below, and the height above of the whole  creation; which is seen, which is heard and understood, and which is invisible? And for this reason  God is "above all principality, and power, and dominion, and every name that is named,"(2) of all  things which have been created and established. He it is who fills the heavens, and views the  abysses, who is also present with every one of us. For he says, "Am I a God at hand, and not a God  afar off? If any man is hid in secret places, shall I not see him?"(3) For His hand lays hold of all  things, and that it is which illumines the heavens, and lightens also the things which are under the  heavens, and trieth the reins and the hearts, is also present in hidden things, and in our secret  [thoughts], and does openly nourish and preserve us.

3. But if man comprehends not the fulness and the greatness of His hand, how shall any one be  able to understand or know in his heart so great a God? Yet, as if they had now measured and  thoroughly investigated Him, and explored Him on every side? they feign that beyond Him there  exists another Pleroma of AEons, and another Father; certainly not looking up to celestial things,  but truly descending into a profound abyss (Bythus) of madness; maintaining that their Father  extends only to the border of those things which are beyond the Pleroma, but that, on the other  hand, the Demiurge does not reach so far as the Pleroma; and thus they represent neither of them  as being perfect and comprehending all things. For the former will be defective in regard to the  whole world formed outside of the Pleroma, and the latter in respect of that [ideal] world which  was formed within the Pleroma; and [therefore] neither of these can be the God of all. But that no  one can fully declare the goodness of God from the things made by Him, is a point evident to all.  And that His greatness is not defective, but contains all things, and extends even to us, and is with  us, every one will confess who entertains worthy conceptions of God.

CHAP. XX.--THAT ONE GOD FORMED ALL THINGS IN THE WORLD, BY MEANS OF THE  WORD AND THE HOLY SPIRIT: AND THAT ALTHOUGH HE IS TO US IN THIS LIFE  INVISIBLE AND INCOMPREHENSIBLE, NEVERTHELESS HE IS NOT UNKNOWN;  INASMUCH AS HIS WORKS DO DECLARE HIM, AND HIS WORD HAS SHOWN THAT IN  MANY MODES HE MAY BE SEEN AND KNOWN.

1. As regards His greatness, therefore, it is not possible to know God, for it is impossible that the  Father can be measured; but as regards His love (for this it is which leads us to God by His Word),  when we obey Him, we do always learn that there is so great a God, and that it is He who by  Himself has established, and selected, and adorned, and contains all things; and among the all  things, both ourselves and this our world. We also then were made, along with those things which  are contained by Him. And this is He of whom the Scripture says, "And God formed man, taking  clay of the earth, and breathed into his face the breath of life."(5) It was not angels, therefore, who  made us, nor who formed us, neither had angels power to make an image of God, nor any one else,  except the Word of the Lord, nor any Power remotely distant from the Father of all things. For God  did not stand in need of these [beings], in order to the accomplishing of what He had Himself  determined with Himself beforehand should be done, as if He did not possess His own hands. For  with Him were always present the Word and Wisdom, the Son and the Spirit, by whom and in  whom, freely and spontaneously, He made all things, to whom also He speaks, saying, "Let Us  make man after Our image and likeness;"(1) He taking from Himself the substance of the creatures  [formed], and the pattern of things made, and the type of all the adornments in the world.

2. Truly, then, the Scripture declared, which says, "First(2) of all believe that there is one God,  who has established all things, and completed them, and having caused that from what had no  being, all things should come into existence:" He who contains all things, and is Himself contained  by no one. Rightly also has Malachi said among the prophets: "Is it not one God who hath  established us? Have we not all one Father?"(3) In accordance with this, too, does the apostle say,  "There is one God, the Father, who is above all, and in us all."(4) Likewise does the Lord also say:  "All things are delivered to Me by My Father;"(5) manifestly by Him who made all things; for He  did not deliver to Him the things of another, but His own. But in all things [it is implied that]  nothing has been kept back [from Him], and for this reason the same person is the Judge of the  living and the dead; "having the key of David: He shall Open, and no man shall shut: He shall  shut, and no man shall open."(6) For no one was able, either in heaven or in earth, or under the  earth, to open the book of the Father, or to behold Him, with the exception of the Lamb who was  slain, and who redeemed us with His own blood, receiving power over all things from the same  God who made all things by the Word, and adorned them by [His] Wisdom, when "the Word was  made flesh;" that even as the Word of God had the sovereignty in the heavens, so also might He  have the sovereignty in earth, inasmuch as [He was] a righteous man, "who did no sin, neither was  there found guile in His mouth;"(7) and that He might have the pre-eminence over those things  which are under the earth, He Himself being made "the first-begotten of the dead;"(8) and that all  things, as I have already said, might behold their King; and that the paternal light might meet with  and rest upon the flesh of our Lord, and come to us from His resplendent flesh, and that thus man  might attain to immortality, having been invested with the paternal light.

3. I have also largely demonstrated, that the Word, namely the Son, was always with the Father;  and that Wisdom also, which is the Spirit, was present with Him, anterior to all creation, He  declares by Solomon: "God by Wisdom founded the earth, and by understanding hath He  established the heaven. By His knowledge the depths burst forth, and the clouds dropped down the  dew."(9) And again: "The Lord created me the beginning of His ways in His work: He set me up  from everlasting, in the beginning, before He made the earth, before He established the depths, and  before the fountains of waters gushed forth; before the mountains were made strong, and before all  the hills, He brought me forth."(10) And again: "When He prepared the heaven, I was with Him,  and when He established the fountains of the deep; when He made the foundations of the earth  strong, I was with Him preparing [them]. I was He in whom He rejoiced, and throughout all time I  was daily glad before His face, when He rejoiced at the completion of the world, and was delighted  in the sons of men."(11)

4. There is therefore one God, who by the Word and Wisdom created and arranged all things;  but this is the Creator (Demiurge) who has granted this world to the human race, and who, as  regards His greatness, is indeed unknown to all who have been made by Him (for no man has  searched out His height, either among the ancients who have gone to their rest, or any of those who  are now alive); but as regards His love, He is always known through Him by whose means He  ordained all things. Now this is His Word, our Lord Jesus Christ, who in the last times was made a  man among men, that He might join the end to the beginning, that is, man to God. Wherefore the  prophets, receiving the prophetic gift from the same Word, announced His advent according to the  flesh, by which the blending and communion of God and man took place according to the good  pleasure of the Father, the Word of God foretelling from the beginning that God should be seen by  men, and hold converse with them upon earth, should confer with them, and should be present with  His own creation, saving it, and becoming capable of being perceived by it, and freeing us from the  hands of all that hate us, that is, from every spirit of wickedness; and causing us to serve Him in  holiness and righteousness all our days,(12) in order that man, having embraced the Spirit of God,  might pass into the glory of the Father.

5. These things did the prophets set forth in a prophetical manner; but they did not, as some  allege, [proclaim] that He who was seen by the prophets was a different [God], the Father of all being invisible. Yet this is what those [heretics] declare, who are altogether ignorant of the  nature of prophecy. For prophecy is a prediction of things future, that is, a setting forth beforehand  of those things which shall be afterwards. The prophets, then, indicated beforehand that God  should be seen by men; as the Lord also says, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see  God."(1) But in respect to His greatness, and His wonderful glory, "no man shall see God and  live,"(2) for the Father is incomprehensible; but in regard to His love, and kindness, and as to His  infinite power, even this He grants to those who love Him, that is, to see God, which thing the  prophets did also predict. "For those things that are impossible with men, are possible with  God."(3) For man does not see God by his own powers; but when He pleases He is seen by men, by  whom He wills, and when He wills, and as He wills. For God is powerful in all things, having been  seen at that time indeed, prophetically through the Spirit, and seen, too, adoptively through the  Son; and He shall also be seen paternally in the kingdom of heaven, the Spirit truly preparing man  in the Son(4) of God, and the Son leading him to the Father, while the Father, too, confers [upon  him] incorruption for eternal life, which comes to every one from the fact of his seeing God. For as  those who see the light are within the light, and partake of its brilliancy; even so, those who see  God are in God, and receive of His splendour. But [His] splendour vivifies them; those, therefore,  who see God, do receive life. And for this reason, He, [although] beyond comprehension, and  boundless and invisible, rendered Himself visible, and comprehensible, and within the capacity of  those who believe, that He might vivify those who receive and behold Him through faith.(5) For as  His greatness is past finding out, so also His goodness is beyond expression; by which having been  seen, He bestows life upon those who see Him. It is not possible to live apart from life, and the  means of life is found in fellowship with God; but fellowship with God is to know God, and to  enjoy His goodness.

6. Men therefore shall see God, that they may live, being made immortal by that sight, and  attaining even unto God; which, as I have already said, was declared figuratively by the prophets,  that God should be seen by men who bear His Spirit [in them], and do always wait patiently for His  coming. As also Moses says in Deuteronomy, "We shall see in that day that God will talk to man,  and he shall live."(6) For certain of these men used to see the prophetic Spirit and His active  influences poured forth for all kinds of gifts; others, again, [beheld] the advent of the Lord, and  that dispensation which obtained from the beginning, by which He accomplished the will of the  Father with regard to things both celestial and terrestrial; and others [beheld] paternal glories  adapted to the times, and to those who saw and who heard them then, and to all who were  subsequently to hear them. Thus, therefore, was God revealed; for God the Father is shown forth  through all these [operations], the Spirit indeed working, and the Son ministering, while the Father  was approving, and man's salvation being accomplished. As He also declares through Hosea the  prophet: "I," He says, "have multiplied visions, and have used similitudes by the ministry (in  manibus) of the prophets."(7) But the apostle expounded this very passage, when he said, "Now  there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are differences of ministrations, but the  same Lord; and there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.  But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal."(8) But as He who  worketh all things in all is God, [as to the points] of what nature and how great He is, [God] is  invisible and indescribable to all things which have been made by Him, but He is by no means  unknown: for all things learn through His Word that there is one God the Father, who contains all  things, and who grants existence to all, as is written in the Gospel: "No man hath seen God at any  time, except the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father; He has declared [Him.]"(9)

7. Therefore the Son of the Father declares [Him] from the beginning, inasmuch as He was with  the Father from the beginning, who did also show to the human race prophetic visions, and  diversities of gifts, and His own ministrations, and the glory of the Father, in regular order and  connection, at the fitting time for the benefit [of mankind]. For where there is a regular succession,  there is also fixedness; and where fixedness, there suitability to the period; and where suitability,  there also utility. And for this reason did the Word become the dispenser of the paternal grace for  the benefit of men, for whom He made such great dispensations, revealing God indeed to men, but  presenting man to God, and preserving at the same time the invisibility of the Father, lest man  should at any time become a despiser of God, and that he should always possess something towards  which he might advance; but, on the other hand, revealing God to men through many  dispensations, lest man, failing away from God altogether, should cease to exist. For the glory of  God is a living man; and the life of man consists in beholding God. For if the manifestation of God  which is made by means of the creation, affords life to all living in the earth, much more does that  revelation of the Father which comes through the Word, give life to those who see God.

8. Inasmuch, then, as the Spirit of God pointed out by the prophets things to come, forming and  adapting us beforehand for the purpose of our being made subject to God, but it was still a future  thing that man, through the good pleasure of the Holy Spirit, should see [God], it necessarily  behoved those through whose instrumentality future things were announced, to see God, whom  they intimated as to be seen by men; in order that God, and the Son of God, and the Son, and the  Father, should not only be prophetically announced, but that He should also be seen by all His  members who are sanctified and instructed in the things of  God, that man might be disciplined beforehand and previously exercised for a reception into that  glory which shall afterwards be revealed in those who love God. For the prophets used not to  prophesy in word alone, but in visions also, and in their mode of life, and in the actions which they  performed, according to the suggestions of the Spirit. After this invisible manner, therefore, did  they see God, as also Esaias says, "I have seen with mine eyes the King, the LORD Of hosts,"(1)  pointing out that man should behold God with his eyes, and hear His voice. In this manner,  therefore, did they also see the Son of God as a man conversant with men, while they prophesied  what was to happen, saying that He who was not come as yet was present proclaiming also the  impassible as subject to suffering, and declaring that He who was then in heaven had descended  into the dust of death.(2) Moreover, [with regard to] the other arrangements concerning the  summing up that He should make, some of these they beheld through visions, others they  proclaimed by word, while others they indicated typically by means of [outward] action, seeing  visibly those things which were to be seen; heralding by word of mouth those which should be  heard; and performing by actual operation what should take place by action; but [at the same time]  announcing all prophetically. Wherefore also Moses declared that God was indeed a consuming  fire(3) (igneum) to the people that transgressed the law, and threatened that God would bring upon  them a day of fire; but to those who had the fear of God he said, "The LORD God is merciful and  gracious, and long-suffering, and of great commiseration, and true, and keeps justice and mercy for  thousands, forgiving unrighteousness, and transgressions, and sins."(4)

9. And the Word spake to Moses, appearing before him, "just as any one might speak to his  friend."(5) But Moses desired to see Him openly who was speaking with him, and was thus  addressed: "Stand in the deep place of the rock, and with My hand I will cover thee. But when My  splendour shall pass by, then thou shalt see My back pans, but My face thou shalt not see: for no  man sees My face, and shall live."(6) Two facts are thus signified: that it is impossible for man to  see God; and that, through the wisdom of God, man shall see Him in the last times, in the depth of  a rock, that is, in His coming as a man. And for this reason did He [the Lord] confer with him face  to face on the top of a mountain, Elias being also present, as the Gospel relates,(7) He thus making  good in the end the ancient promise.

10. The prophets, therefore, did not openly behold the actual face of God, but [they saw] the  dispensations and the mysteries through which man should afterwards see God. As was also said to  Elias: "Thou shalt go forth tomorrow, and stand in the presence of the LORD; and, behold, a wind  great and strong, which shall rend the mountains, and break the rocks in pieces before the LORD.  And the LORD [was] not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD [was] not  in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord [was] not in the fire; and after the  fire a scarcely audible voice" (vox aurae tenuis).(8) For by such means was the prophet--very  indignant, because of the transgression of the people and the slaughter of the prophets--both taught  to act in a more gentle manner; and the Lord's advent as a man was pointed out, that it should be  subsequent to that law which was given by Moses, mild and tranquil, in which He would neither  break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax.(9) The mild and peaceful repose of His  kingdom was indicated likewise. For, after the wind which rends the mountains, and after the  earthquake, and after the fire, come the tranquil and peaceful times of His kingdom, in which the  spirit of God does, in the most gentle manner, vivify and increase mankind. This, too, was made  still clearer by Ezekiel, that the prophets saw the dispensations of God in part, but not actually God  Himself. For when this man had seen the vision(1) of God, and the cherubim, and their wheels, and  when he had recounted the mystery of the whole of that progression, and had beheld the likeness of  a throne above them, and upon the throne a likeness as of the figure of a man, and the things which  were upon his loins as the figure of amber, and what was below like the sight of fire, and when he  set forth all the rest of the vision of the thrones, lest any one might happen to think that in those  [visions] he had actually seen God, he added: "This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory  of God."(2)

11. If, then, neither Moses, nor Elias, nor Ezekiel, who had all many celestial visions, did see  God; but if what they did see were similitudes of the splendour of the Lord, And prophecies of  things to come; it is manifest that the Father is indeed invisible, of whom also the Lord said, "No  man hath seen God at any time."(3) But His Word, as He Himself willed it, and for the benefit of  those who beheld, did show the Father's brightness, and explained His purposes (as also the Lord  said: "The only-begotten God,(4) which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared [Him];"  and He does Himself also interpret the Word of the Father as being rich and great); not in one  figure, nor in one character, did He appear to those seeing Him, but according to the reasons and  effects aimed at in His dispensations, as it is written in Daniel. For at one time He was seen with  those who were around Ananias, Azarias, Misael, as present with them in the furnace of fire, in the  burning, and preserving them from [the effects of] fire: "And the appearance of the fourth," it is  said, "was like to the Son of God."(5) At another time [He is represented as] "a stone cut out of the  mountain without hands,"(6) and as smiting all temporal kingdoms, and as blowing them away  (ventilans ea), and as Himself filling all the earth. Then, too, is this same individual beheld as the  Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven, and drawing near to the Ancient of Days, and  receiving from Him all power and glory, and a kingdom. "His dominion," it is said, "is an  everlasting dominion, and His kingdom shall not perish."(7) John also, the Lord's disciple, when  beholding the sacerdotal and glorious advent of His kingdom, says in the Apocalypse: "I turned to  see the voice that spake with me. And, being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks; and in the  midst of the candlesticks One like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment reaching to the  feet, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle; and His head and His hairs were white, as white  as wool, and as snow; and His eyes were as a flame of fire; and His feet like unto fine brass, as if  He burned in a furnace. And His voice [was] as the voice of waters; and He had in His right hand  seven stars; and out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword; and His countenance was as the  sun shining in his strength."(8) For in these words He sets forth something of the glory [which He  has received] from His Father, as [where He makes mention of] the head; something in reference to  the priestly office also, as in the case of the long garment reaching to the feet. And this was the  reason why Moses vested the high priest after this fashion.

Something also alludes to the end [of all  things], as [where He speaks of] the fine brass burning in the fire, which denotes the power of faith,  and the continuing instant in prayer, because of the consuming fire which is to come at the end of  time. But when John could not endure the sight (for he says, "I fell at his feet as dead;"(9) that what  was written might come to pass: "No man sees God, and shall live"(10)), and the Word reviving  him, and reminding him that it was He upon whose bosom he had leaned at supper, when he put  the question as to who should betray Him, declared: "I am the first and the last, and He who liveth,  and was dead, and behold I am alive for evermore, and have the keys of death and of hell." And  after these things, seeing the same Lord in a second vision, he says: "For I saw in the midst of the  throne, and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, a Lamb standing as it had  been slain, having seven horns, and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God, sent forth into  all the earth."(11) And again, he says, speaking of this very same Lamb: "And behold a white  horse; and He that sat upon him was called Faithful and True; and in righteousness doth He judge  and make war. And His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns; having a  name written, that no man knoweth but Himself: and He was girded around with a vesture  sprinkled with blood: and His name is called The Word of God. And the armies of heaven followed  Him upon white horses, clothed in pure white linen. And out of His mouth goeth a sharp sword,  that with it He may smite the nations; and He shall rule (pascet) them with a rod of iron: and He  treadeth the wine-press of the fierceness of the wrath of God Almighty. And He hath upon His  vesture and upon His thigh a name written, KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS."(1) Thus  does the Word of God always preserve the outlines, as it were, of things to come, and points out to  men the various forms (species), as it were, of the dispensations of the Father, teaching us the  things pertaining to God.

12. However, it was not by means of visions alone which were seen, and words which were  proclaimed, but also in actual works, that He was beheld by the prophets, in order that through  them He might prefigure and show forth future events beforehand. For this reason did Hosea the  prophet take "a wife of whoredoms," prophesying by means of the action, "that in committing  fornication the earth should fornicate from the LORD,"(2) that is, the men who are upon the earth;  and from men of this stamp it will be God's good pleasure to take out(3) a Church which shall be  sanctified by fellowship with His Son, just as that woman was sanctified by intercourse with the  prophet. And for this reason, Paul declares that the "unbelieving wife is sanctified by the believing  husband."(4) Then again, the prophet names his children, "Not having obtained mercy," and "Not  a people,"(5) in order that, as says the apostle, "what was not a people may become a people; and  she who did not obtain mercy may obtain mercy. And it shall come to pass, that in the place where  it was said, This is not a people, there shall they be called the children of the living God."(6) That  which had been done typically through his actions by the prophet, the apostle proves to have been  done truly by Christ in the Church. Thus, too, did Moses also take to wife an Ethiopian woman,  whom he thus made an Israelitish one, showing by anticipation that the wild olive tree is grafted  into the cultivated olive, and made to partake of its fatness.

For as He who was born Christ  according to the flesh, had indeed to be sought after by the people in order to be slain, but was to be  set free in Egypt, that is, among the Gentiles, to sanctify those who were there in a state of infancy,  from whom also He perfected His Church in that place (for Egypt was Gentile from the beginning,  as was Ethiopia also); for this reason, by means of the marriage of Moses, was shown forth the  marriage of the Word;(7) and by means of the Ethiopian bride, the Church taken from among the  Gentiles was made manifest; and those who do detract from, accuse, and deride it, shall not be  pure. For they shall be full of leprosy, and expelled from the camp of the righteous. Thus also did  Rahab the harlot, while condemning herself, inasmuch as she was a Gentile, guilty of all sins,  nevertheless receive the three spies,(8) who were spying out all the land, and hid them at her home;  [which three were] doubtless [a type of] the Father and the Son, together with the Holy Spirit. And  when the entire city in which she lived fell to ruins at the sounding of the seven trumpets, Rahab  the harlot was preserved, when all was over [in ultimis], together with all her house, through faith  of the scarlet sign; as the Lord also declared to those who did not receive His advent,--the  Pharisees, no doubt, nullify the sign of the scarlet thread, which meant the passover, and the  redemption and exodus of the people from Egypt,-- when He said, "The publicans and the harlots  go into the kingdom of heaven before you."(9)

CHAP. XXI.--ABRAHAM'S FAITH WAS IDENTICAL WITH OURS; THIS FAITH WAS  PREFIGURED BY THE WORDS AND ACTIONS OF THE OLD PATRIARCHS.

1. But that our faith was also prefigured in Abraham, and that he was the patriarch of our faith,  and, as it were, the prophet of it, the apostle has very fully taught, when he says in the Epistle to  the Galatians: "He therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you,  [doeth he it] by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Even as Abraham believed God,  and it was accounted unto him for righteousness. Know ye therefore, that they which are of faith,  the same are the children of Abraham. But the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the  heathen through faith, announced beforehand unto Abraham, that in him all nations should be  blessed. So then they which be of faith shall be blessed with faithful Abraham."(10) For which  [reasons the apostle] declared that this man was not only the prophet of faith, but also the father of  those who from among the Gentiles believe in Jesus Christ, because his faith and ours are one and  the same: for he believed in things future, as if they were already accomplished, because of the  promise of God; and in like manner do we also, because of the promise of God, behold through  faith that inheritance [laid up for us] in the [future] kingdom.

2. The history of Isaac, too, is not without a symbolical character. For in the Epistle to the  Romans, the apostle declares: "Moreover, when Rebecca had conceived by one, even by our father  Isaac," she received answer(1) from the Word, "that the purpose of God according to election might  stand, not of works, but of Him that calleth, it was said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb, and  two manner of people are in thy body; and the one people shall overcome the other, and the eider  shall serve the younger."(2) From which it is evident, that not only [were there] prophecies of the  patriarchs, but also that the children brought forth by Rebecca were a prediction of the two nations;  and that the one should be indeed the greater, but the other the less; that the one also should be  under bondage, but the other free; but [that both should be] of one and the same father. Our God,  one and the same, is also their God, who knows hidden things, who knoweth all things before they  can come to pass; and for this reason has He said, "Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated."(3)

3. If any one, again, will look into Jacob's actions, he shall find them not destitute of meaning,  but full of import with regard to the dispensations. Thus, in the first place, at his birth, since he  laid hold on his brother's heel,(4) he was called Jacob, that is, the supplanter--one who holds, but is  not held; binding the feet, but not being bound; striving and conquering; grasping in his hand his  adversary's heel, that is, victory. For to this end was the Lord born, the type of whose birth he set  forth beforehand, of whom also John says in the Apocalypse: "He went forth conquering, that He  should conquer."(5) In the next place, [Jacob] received the rights of the first-born, when his brother  looked on them with contempt; even as also the younger nation received Him, Christ, the first- begotten, when the elder nation rejected Him, saying, "We have no king but Caesar."(6) But in  Christ every blessing [is summed up], and therefore the latter people has snatched away the  blessings of the former from the Father, just as Jacob took away the blessing of this Esau. For  which cause his brother suffered the plots and persecutions of a brother, just as the Church suffers  this self-same thing from the Jews. In a foreign country were the twelve tribes born, the race of  Israel, inasmuch as Christ was also, in a strange country, to generate the twelve-pillared foundation  of the Church. Various coloured sheep were allotted to this Jacob as his wages; and the wages of  Christ are human beings, who from various and diverse nations come together into one cohort of  faith, as the Father promised Him, saying, "Ask of Me, and I will give Thee the heathen for Thine  inheritance, the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession."(7) And as from the multitude of  his sons the prophets of the Lord [afterwards] arose, there was every necessity that Jacob should  beget sons from the two sisters, even as Christ did from the two laws of one and the same Father;  and in like manner also from the handmaids, indicating that Christ should raise up sons of God,  both from freemen and from slaves after the flesh, bestowing upon all, in the same manner, the gift  of the Spirit, who vivifies us.(8) But he (Jacob) did all things for the sake of the younger, she who  had the handsome eyes,(9) Rachel, who prefigured the Church, for which Christ endured patiently;  who at that time, indeed, by means of His patriarchs and prophets, was prefiguring and declaring  beforehand future things, fulfilling His part by anticipation in the dispensations of God, and  accustoming His inheritance to obey God, and to pass through the world as in a state of pilgrimage,  to follow His word, and to indicate beforehand things to come. For with God there is nothing  without purpose or due signification.

CHAP. XXII.--CHRIST DID NOT COME FOR THE SAKE OF THE MEN OF ONE AGE ONLY,  BUT FOR ALL WHO, LIVING RIGHTEOUSLY AND PIOUSLY, HAD BELIEVED UPON HIM;  AND FOR THOSE, TOO, WHO SHALL BELIEVE.

1 Now in the last days, when the fulness of the time of liberty had arrived, the Word Himself did  by Himself "wash away the filth of the daughters of Zion,"(10) when He washed the disciples' feet  with His own hands.(11) For this is the end of the human race inheriting God; that as in the  beginning, by means of our first [parents], we were all brought into bondage, by being made subject  to death; so at last, by means of the New Man, all who from the beginning [were His] disciples,  having been cleansed and washed from things pertaining to death, should come to the life of God.  For He who washed the feet of the disciples sanctified the entire body, and rendered it clean. For  this reason, too, He administered food to them in a recumbent posture, indicating that those who  were lying in the earth were they to whom He came to impart life. As Jeremiah declares, "The holy  Lord remembered His dead Israel, who slept in the land of sepulture; and He descended to them to  make known to them His salvation, that they might be saved."(1) For this reason also were the eyes  of the disciples weighed down when Christ's passion was approaching; and when, in the first  instance, the Lord found them sleeping, He let it pass,--thus indicating the patience of God in  regard to the state of slumber in which men lay; but coming the second time, He aroused them, and  made them stand up, in token that His passion is the arousing of His sleeping disciples, on whose  account "He also descended into the lower parts of the earth,"(2) to behold with His eyes the state  of those who were resting from their labours,(3) in reference to whom He did also declare to the  disciples: "Many prophets and righteous men have desired to see and hear what ye do see and  hear."(4)

2. For it was not merely for those who believed on Him in the time of Tiberius Caesar that Christ  came, nor did the Father exercise His providence for the men only who are now alive, but for all  men altogether, who from the beginning, according to their capacity, in their generation have both  feared and loved God, and practised justice and piety towards their neighbours, and have earnestly  desired to see Christ, and to hear His voice. Wherefore He shall, at His second coming, first rouse  from their sleep all persons of this description, and shall raise them up, as well as the rest who  shall be judged, and give them a place in His kingdom. For it is truly "one God who" directed the  patriarchs towards His dispensations, and "has justified the circumcision by faith, and the  uncircumcision through faith."(5) For as in the first we were prefigured, so, on the other hand, are  they represented in us, that is, in the Church, and receive the recompense for those things which  they accomplished.

CHAP. XXIII.--THE PATRIARCHS AND PROPHETS BY POINTING OUT THE ADVENT OF  CHRIST, FORTIFIED THEREBY, AS IT WERE, THE WAY OF POSTERITY TO THE FAITH  OF CHRIST; AND SO THE LABOURS OF THE APOSTLES WERE LESSENED INASMUCH  AS THEY GATHERED IN THE FRUITS OF THE LABOURS OF OTHERS.

1. For which reason the Lord declared to the disciples: "Behold, I say unto you, Lift up your  eyes, and look upon the districts (regiones), for they are white [already] to harvest. For the harvest- man receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal, that both he that soweth and he that  reapeth may rejoice together. For in this is the saying true, that one soweth and another reapeth.  For I have sent you forward to reap that whereon ye bestowed no labour; other men have laboured,  and ye have entered into their labours."(6) Who, then, are they that have laboured, and have helped  forward the dispensations of God? It is clear that they are the patriarchs and prophets, who even  prefigured our faith, and disseminated through the earth the advent of the Son of God, who and  what He should be: so that posterity, possessing the fear of God, might easily accept the advent of  Christ, having been instructed by the prophets. And for this reason it was, that when Joseph  became aware that Mary was with child, and was minded to put her away privily, the angel said to  him in sleep: "Fear not to take to thee Mary thy wife; for that which is conceived in her is of the  Holy Ghost.
 
 

For she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus; for He shall save  His people from their sins."(7) And exhorting him [to this], he added: "Now all this has been done,  that it might be fulfilled which was spoken from the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and His name shall be called Emmanuel;" thus influencing him by the words of the prophet, and warding off blame from Mary, pointing out that it  was she who was the virgin mentioned by Isaiah beforehand, who should give birth to Emmanuel.  Wherefore, when Joseph was convinced beyond all doubt, he both did take Mary, and joyfully  yielded obedience in regard to all the rest of the education of Christ, undertaking a journey into  Egypt and back again, and then a removal to Nazareth. [For this reason,] those who knew not the  Scriptures nor the promise of God, nor the dispensation of Christ, at last called him the father of  the child. For this reason, too, did the Lord Himself read at Capernaum the prophecies of Isaiah:(8)  "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath anointed Me; to preach the Gospel to the poor  hath He sent Me, to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and sight to the  blind."(9) At the same time, showing that it was He Himself who had been foretold by Esaias the  prophet, He said to them: "This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears."

2. For this reason, also, Philip, when he had discovered the eunuch of the Ethiopians' queen  reading these words which had been written: "He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and as a lamb  is dumb before the shearer, so He opened not His mouth: in His humiliation His judgment was  taken away;"(10) and all the rest which the prophet proceeded to relate in regard to His passion and  His coming in the flesh, and how He was dishonoured by those who did not believe Him; easily  persuaded him to believe on Him, that He was Christ Jesus, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate,  and suffered whatsoever the prophet had predicted, and that He was the Son of God, who gives  eternal life to men. And immediately when [Philip] had baptized him, he departed from him. For  nothing else [but baptism] was wanting to him who had been already instructed by the prophets: he  was not ignorant of God the Father, nor of the rules as to the [proper] manner of life, but was  merely ignorant of the advent of the Son of God, which, when he had become acquainted with, in a  short space of time, he went on his way rejoicing, to be the herald in Ethiopia of Christ's advent.  Therefore Philip had no great labour to go through with regard to this man, because he was already  prepared in the fear of God by the prophets. For this reason, too, did the apostles, collecting the  sheep which had perished of the house of Israel, and discoursing to them from the Scriptures, prove  that this crucified Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God; and they persuaded a great  multitude, who, however, [already] possessed the fear of God. And there were, in one day, baptized  three, and four, and five thousand men.(1)

CHAP XXIV.--THE CONVERSION OF THE GENTILES WAS MORE DIFFICULT THAN  THAT OF THE JEWS; THE LABOURS OF THOSE APOSTLES, THEREFORE WHO  ENGAGED IN THE FORMER TASK, WERE GREATER THAN THOSE WHO UNDERTOOK  THE LATTER.

I. Wherefore also Paul, since he was the apostle of the Gentiles, says, "I laboured more than they  all."(2) For the instruction of the former, [viz., the Jews,] was an easy task, because they could  allege proofs from the Scriptures, and because they, who were in the habit of hearing Moses and  the prophets, did also readily receive the First-begotten of the dead, and the Prince of the life of  God,--Him who, by the spreading forth of hands, did destroy Amalek, and vivify man from the  wound of the serpent, by means of faith which was [exercised] towards Him. As I have pointed out  in the preceding book, the apostle did, in the first place, instruct the Gentiles to depart from the  superstition of idols, and to worship one God, the Creator of heaven and earth, and the Framer of  the whole creation; and that His Son was His Word, by whom He founded all things; and that He,  in the last times, was made a man among men; that He reformed the human race, but destroyed and  conquered the enemy of man, and gave to His handiwork victory against the adversary. But  although they who were of the circumcision still did not obey the words of God, for they were  despisers, yet they were previously instructed not to commit adultery, nor fornication, nor theft, nor  fraud; and that whatsoever things are done to our neighbours' prejudice, were evil, and detested by  God. Wherefore also they did readily agree to abstain from these things, because they had been thus  instructed.

2. But they were bound to teach the Gentiles also this very thing, that works of such a nature  were wicked, prejudicial, and useless, and destructive to those who engaged in them. Wherefore he  who had received the apostolate to the Gentiles,(3) did labour more than those who preached the  Son of God among them of the circumcision. For they were assisted by the Scriptures, which the  Lord confirmed and tiff-filled, in coming such as He had been announced; but here, [in the case of  the Gentiles,] there was a certain foreign erudition, and a new doctrine [to be received, namely],  that the gods of the nations not only were no gods at all, but even the idols of demons; and that  there is one God, who is "above all principality, and dominion, and power, and every name which  is named;"(4) and that His Word, invisible by nature, was made palpable and visible among men,  and did descend "to death, even the death of the cross;"(5) also, that they who believe in Him shall  be incorruptible and not subject to suffering, and shall receive the kingdom of heaven. These  things, too, were preached to the Gentiles by word, without [the aid of] the Scriptures: wherefore,  also, they who preached among the Gentiles underwent greater labour. But, on the other hand, the  faith of the Gentiles is proved to be of a more noble description, since they followed the word of  God without the instruction [derived] from the [sacred] writings (sine instructione literarum).

CHAP. XXV.--BOTH COVENANTS WERE PREFIGURED IN ABRAHAM, AND IN THE  LABOUR OF TAMAR; THERE WAS, HOWEVER, BUT ONE AND THE SAME GOD TO  EACH COVENANT..

I. For thus it had behoved the sons of Abraham [to be], whom God has raised up to him from the  stones,(6) and caused to take a place beside him who was made the chief and the forerunner of our  faith (who did also receive the covenant of circumcision, after that justification by faith which had  pertained to him, when he was yet in uncircumcision, so that in him both covenants might be  prefigured, that he might be the father of all who follow the Word of God, and who sustain a life of  pilgrimage in this world, that is, of those who from among the circumcision and of those from  among the uncircumcision are faithful, even as also "Christ(1) is the chief corner-stone" sustaining  all things); and He gathered into the one faith of Abraham those who, from either covenant, are  eligible for God's building. But this faith which is in uncircumcision, as connecting the end with  the beginning, has been made [both] the first and the last. For, as I have shown, it existed in  Abraham antecedently to circumcision, as it also did in the rest of the righteous who pleased God:  and in these last times, it again sprang up among mankind through the coming of the Lord. But  circumcision and the law of works occupied the intervening period.(2)

2. This fact is indeed set forth by many other [occurrences], but typically by [the history of]  Thamar, Judah's daughter-in-law.(3) For when she had conceived twins, one of them put forth his  hand first; and as the midwife supposed that he was the first-born, she bound a scarlet token on his  hand. But after this had been done, and he had drawn back his hand, his brother Phares came forth  the first; then, after him, Zara, upon whom was the scarlet line, [was born] the second: the  Scripture clearly pointing out that people which possessed the scarlet sign, that is, faith in a state of  circumcision, which was shown beforehand, indeed, in the patriarchs first; but after that  withdrawn, that his brother might be born; and also, in like manner, him who was the elder, as  being born in the second place, [him] who was distinguished by the scarlet token which was  [fastened] on him, that is, the passion of the Just One, which was prefigured from the beginning in  Abel, and described by the prophets, but perfected in the last times in the Son of God.

3. For it was requisite that certain facts should be announced beforehand by the fathers in a  paternal manner, and others prefigured by the prophets in a legal one, but others, described after  the form of Christ, by those who have received the adoption; while in one God are all things shown  forth. For although Abraham was one, he did in himself prefigure the two covenants, in which  some indeed have sown, while others have reaped; for it is said, "In this is the saying true, that it is  one 'people' who sows, but another who shall reap;"(4) but it is one God who bestows things  suitable upon both--seed to the sower, but bread for the reaper to eat. Just as it is one that planteth,  and another who watereth, but one God who giveth the increase.(5) For the patriarchs and prophets  sowed the word [concerning] Christ, but the Church reaped, that is, received the fruit. For this  reason, too, do these very men (the prophets) also pray to have a dwelling-place in it, as Jeremiah  says, "Who will give me in the desert the last dwelling-place?"(6) in order that both the sower and  the reaper may rejoice together in the kingdom of Christ, who is present with all those who were  from the beginning approved by God, who granted them His Word to be present with them.(7)

CHAP. XXVI.--THE TREASURE HID IN THE SCRIPTURES IS CHRIST; THE TRUE EXPOSITION OF THE SCRIPTURES IS TO BE FOUND IN THE CHURCH ALONE.

1. If any one, therefore, reads the Scriptures with attention, he will find in them an account of  Christ, and a foreshadowing of the new calling (vocationis). For Christ is the treasure which was  hid in the field,(8) that is, in this world (for "the field is the world"(9)); but the treasure hid in the  Scriptures is Christ, since He was pointed out by means of types and parables. Hence His human  nature could not(10) be understood, prior to the consummation of those things which had been  predicted, that is, the advent of Christ. And therefore it was said to Daniel the prophet: "Shut up  the words, and seal the book even to the time of consummation, until many learn, and knowledge  be completed. For at that time, when the dispersion shall be accomplished, they shall know all  these things."(11) But Jeremiah also says, "In the last days they shall understand these things."(12)  For every prophecy, before its fulfilment, is to men [full of] enigmas and ambiguities. But when the  time has arrived, and the prediction has come to pass, then the prophecies have a clear and certain  exposition. And for this reason, indeed, when at this present time the law is read to the Jews, it is  like a fable; for they do not possess the explanation of all things pertaining to the advent of the Son  of God, which took place in human nature; but when it is read by the Christians, it is a treasure,  hid indeed in a field, but brought to light by the cross of Christ, and explained, both enriching the  understanding of men, and showing forth the wisdom of God and declaring His dispensations with  regard to man, and forming the kingdom of Christ beforehand, and preaching by anticipation the  inheritance of the holy Jerusalem, and proclaiming beforehand that the man who loves God shall  arrive at such excellency as even to see God, and hear His word, and from the hearing of His  discourse be glorified to such an extent, that others cannot behold the glory of his countenance, as  was said by Daniel: "Those who do understand, shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and  many of the righteous(1) as the stars for ever and ever.''(2) Thus, then, I have shown it to be,(3) if  any one read the Scriptures. For thus it was that the Lord discoursed with, the disciples after His  resurrection from the dead, proving to them from the Scriptures themselves "that Christ must  suffer, and enter into His glory, and that remission of sins should be preached in His name  throughout all the world."(4) And the disciple will be perfected, and [rendered] like the  householder, "who bringeth forth from his treasure things new and old."(5)

2. Wherefore it is incumbent to obey the presbyters who are in the Church,--those who, as I have  shown, possess the succession from the apostles; those who, together with the succession of the  episcopate, have received the certain gift of truth, according to the good pleasure of the Father. But  [it is also incumbent] to hold in suspicion others who depart from the primitive succession, and  assemble themselves together in any place whatsoever, [looking upon them] either as heretics of  perverse minds, or as schismaries puffed up and self-pleasing, or again as hypocrites, acting thus  for the sake of lucre and vainglory. For all these have fallen from the truth. And the heretics,  indeed, who bring strange fire to the altar of God--namely, strange doctrines--shall be burned up by  the fire from heaven, as were Nadab and Abiud.(6) But such as rise up in opposition to the truth,  and exhort others against the Church of God, [shall] remain among those in hell (apud inferos),  being swallowed up by an earthquake, even as those who were with Chore, Dathan, and Abiron.(7)  But those who cleave asunder, and separate the unity of the Church, [shall] receive from God the  same punishment as Jeroboam did.(8)

3. Those, however, who are believed to be presbyters by many, but serve their own lusts, and, do  not place the fear of God supreme in their hearts, but conduct themselves with contempt towards  others, and are puffed up with the pride of holding the chief seat, and work evil deeds in secret,  saying, "No man sees us," shall be convicted by the Word, who does not judge after outward  appearance (secundum gloriam), nor looks upon the countenance, but the heart; and they shall hear  those words, to be found in Daniel the prophet: "O thou seed of Canaan, and not of Judah, beauty  hath deceived thee, and lust perverted thy heart.(9) Thou that art waxen old in wicked days, now  thy sins which thou hast committed aforetime are come to light; for thou hast pronounced false  judgments, and hast been accustomed to condemn the innocent, and to let the guilty go free, albeit  the Lord saith, The innocent and the righteous shalt thou not slay."(10) Of whom also did the Lord  say: "But if the evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming, and shall begin to  smite the man-servants and maidens, and to eat and drink and be drunken; the lord of that servant  shall come in a day that he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, and shall  cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the unbelievers."(11)

4. From all such persons, therefore, it be-bores us to keep aloof, but to adhere to those who, as I  have already observed, do hold the doctrine of the apostles, and who, together with the order of  priesthood (presbyterii ordine), display sound speech and blameless conduct for the confirmation  and correction of others.(12) In this way, Moses, to whom such a leadership was entrusted, relying  on a good conscience, cleared himself before God, saying, "I have not in covetousness taken  anything belonging to one of these men, nor have I done evil to one of them."(13) In this way, too,  Samuel, who judged the people so many years, and bore rule over Israel without any pride, in the  end cleared himself, saying, "I have walked before you from my childhood even unto this day:  answer me in the sight of God, and before His anointed (Christi ejus); whose ox or whose ass of  yours have I taken, or over whom have I tyrannized, or whom have I oppressed? or if I have  received from the hand of any a bribe or [so much as] a shoe, speak out against me, and I will  restore it to you."(1) And when the people had said to him, "Thou hast not tyrannized, neither hast  thou oppressed us neither hast thou taken ought of any man's hand," he called the Lord to witness,  saying, "The Lord is witness, and His Anointed is witness this day, that ye have not found ought in  my hand. And they said to him, He is witness." In this strain also the Apostle Paul, inasmuch as he  had a good conscience, said to the Corinthians: "For we are not as many, who corrupt the Word of  God: but as of sincerity, but as of God, in the sight of God speak we in Christ;"(2) "We have  injured no man, corrupted no man, circumvented no man."(3)

5. Such presbyters does the Church nourish, of whom also the prophet says: "I will give thy  rulers in peace, and thy bishops in righteousness."(4) Of whom also did the Lord declare, "Who  then shall be a faithful steward (actor), good and wise, whom the Lord sets over His household, to  give them their meat in due season? Blessed is that servant whom his Lord, when He cometh, shall  find so doing."(5) Paul then, teaching us where one may find such, says, "God hath placed in the  Church, first, apostles; secondly, prophets; thirdly, teachers."(6) Where, therefore, the gifts of the  Lord have been placed, there it behoves us to learn the truth, [namely,] from those who possess that  succession of the Church which is from the apostles? and among whom exists that which is sound  and blameless in conduct, as well as that which is unadulterated and incorrupt in speech. For these  also preserve this faith of ours in one God who created all things; and they increase that love  [which we have] for the Son of God, who accomplished such marvellous dispensations for our sake:  and they expound the Scriptures to us without danger, neither blaspheming God, nor dishonouring  the patriarchs, nor despising the prophets.

CHAP. XXVII--THE SINS OF THE MEN OF OLD TIME, WHICH INCURRED THE  DISPLEASURE OF GOD, WERE, BY HIS PROVIDENCE, COMMITTED TO WRITING, THAT  WE MIGHT DERIVE INSTRUCTION THEREBY, AND NOT BE FILLED WITH PRIDE. WE  MUST NOT, THEREFORE, INFER THAT THERE WAS ANOTHER GOD THAN HE WHOM  CHRIST PREACHED; WE SHOULD RATHER FEAR, LEST THE ONE AND THE SAME GOD  WHO INFLICTED PUNISHMENT ON THE ANCIENTS, SHOULD BRING DOWN HEAVIER  UPON US.

I. As I have heard from a certain presbyter,(8) who had heard it from those who had seen the  apostles, and from those who had been their disciples, the punishment [declared] in Scripture was  sufficient for the ancients in regard to what they did without the Spirit's guidance. For as God is no  respecter of persons, He inflicted a proper punishment on deeds displeasing to Him. As in the case  of David,(9) when he suffered persecution from Saul for righteousness' sake, and fled from King  Saul, and would not avenge himself of his enemy, he both sung the advent of Christ, and instructed  the nations in wisdom, and did everything after the Spirit's guidance, and pleased God. But when  his lust prompted him to take Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah, the Scripture said concerning him,  "Now, the thing (sermo) which David had done appeared wicked in the eyes of the LORD;"(10)  and Nathan the prophet is sent to him, pointing out to him his crime, in order that he, passing  sentence upon and condemning himself, might obtain mercy and forgiveness from Christ: "And  [Nathan] said to him, There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor. The rich  man had exceeding many flocks and herds; but the poor man had nothing, save one little ewe- lamb, which he possessed, and nourished up; and it had been with him and with his children  together: it did eat of his own bread, and drank of his cup, and was to him as a daughter. And there  came a guest unto the rich man; and he spared to take of the flock of his own ewe-lambs, and from  the herds of his own oxen, to entertain the guest; but he took the ewe-lamb of the poor man, and set  it before the man that had come unto him. And David's anger was greatly kindied against the man;  and he said to Nathan, As the Lord liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely die (filius  mortis est): and he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he hath done this thing, and because he  had no pity for the poor man. And Nathan said unto him, Thou art the man who hast done  this."(11) And then he proceeds with the rest [of the narrative], upbraiding him, and recounting  God's benefits towards him, and [showing him] how much his conduct had displeased the Lord.  For [he declared] that works of this nature were not pleasing to God, but that great wrath was  suspended over his house. David, however, was struck with remorse on heating this, and  exclaimed, "I have sinned against the Lord;" and he sung a penitential psalm, waiting for the  coming of the Lord, who washes and makes clean the man who had been fast bound with [the  chain of] sin. In like manner it was with regard to Solomon, while he continued to judge uprightly,  and to declare the wisdom of God, and built the temple as the type of truth, and set forth the glories  of God, and announced the peace about to come upon the nations, and prefigured the kingdom of  Christ, and spake three thousand parables about the Lord's advent, and five thousand songs,  singing praise to God, and expounded the wisdom of God in creation, [discoursing] as to the nature  of every tree, every herb, and of all fowls, quadrupeds, and fishes; and he said, "Will God whom  the heavens cannot contain, really dwell with men upon the earth?"(1) And he pleased God, and  was the admiration of all; and all kings of the earth sought an interview with him (quaerebant  faciem ejus) that they might hear the wisdom which God had conferred upon him.(2)

The queen of  the south, too, came to him from the ends of the earth, to ascertain the wisdom that was in him:(3)  she whom the Lord also referred to as one who should rise up in the judgment with the nations of  those men who do hear His words, and do not believe in Him, and should condemn them,  inasmuch as she submitted herself to the wisdom announced by the servant of God, while these  men despised that wisdom which proceeded directly from the Son of God. For Solomon was a  servant, but Christ is indeed the Son of God, and the Lord of Solomon. While, therefore, he served  God without blame, and ministered to His dispensations, then was he glorified: but when he took  wives from all nations, and permitted them to set up idols in Israel, the Scripture spake thus  concerning him: "And King Solomon was a lover of women, and he took to himself foreign  women; and it came to pass, when Solomon was old, his heart was not perfect with the Lord his  God. And the foreign women turned away his heart after strange gods. And Solomon did evil in the  sight of the Lord: he did not walk after the Lord, as did David his father. And the Lord was angry  with Solomon; for his heart was not perfect with the Lord, as was the heart of David his father."(4)  The Scripture has thus sufficiently reproved him, as the presbyter remarked, in order that no flesh  may glory in the sight of the Lord.

2. It was for this reason, too, that the Lord descended into the regions beneath the earth,  preaching His advent there also, and [declaring] the remission of sins received by those who  believe in Him.(5) Now all those believed in Him who had hope towards Him, that is, those who  proclaimed His advent, and submitted to His dispensations, the righteous men, the prophets, and  the patriarchs, to whom He remitted sins in the same way as He did to us, which sins we should  not lay to their charge, if we would not despise the grace of God. For as these men did not impute  unto us (the Gentiles) our transgressions, which we wrought before Christ was manifested among  us, so also it is not right that we should lay blame upon those who sinned before Christ's coming.  For "all men come short of the glory of God,"(6) and are not justified of themselves, but by the  advent of the Lord,--they who earnestly direct their eyes towards His light. And it is for our  instruction that their actions have been committed to writing, that we might know, in the first  place, that our God and theirs is one, and that sins do not please Him although committed by men  of renown; and in the second place, that we should keep from wickedness. For if these men of old  time, who preceded us in the gifts [bestowed upon them], and for whom the Son of God had not yet  suffered, when they committed any sin and served fleshly lusts, were rendered objects of such  disgrace, what shall the men of the present day suffer, who have despised the Lord's coming, and  become the slaves of their own lusts? And truly the death of the Lord became [the means of]  healing and remission of sins to the former, but Christ shall not die again in behalf of those who  now commit sin, for death shall no more have dominion over Him; but the Son shall come in the  glory of the Father, requiring from His stewards and dispensers the money which He had entrusted  to them, with usury; and from those to whom He had given most shall He demand most. We ought  not, therefore, as that presbyter remarks, to be puffed up, nor be severe upon those of old time, but  ought ourselves to fear, lest perchance, after [we have come to] the knowledge of Christ, if we do  things displeasing to God, we obtain no further forgiveness of sins, but be shut out from His  kingdom.(6) And therefore it was that Paul said, "For if [God] spared not the natural branches,  [take heed] lest He also spare not thee, who, when thou wert a wild olive tree, wert grafted into the  fatness of the olive tree, and wert made a partaker of its fatness."(7)

3. Thou wilt notice, too, that the transgressions of the common people have been described in like  manner, not for the sake of those who did then transgress, but as a means of instruction unto us,  and that we should understand that it is one and the same God against whom these men sinned,  and against whom certain persons do now transgress from among those who profess to have  believed in Him. But this also, [as the presbyter states,] has Paul declared most plainly in the  Epistle to the Corinthians, when he says, "Brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how  that all our fathers were under the cloud, and were all baptized unto Moses in the sea, and did all  eat the same spiritual meat, and did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that  spiritual rock that followed them; and the rock was Christ. But with many of them God was not  well pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. These things were for our example (in  figuram nostri), to the intent that we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted; neither be  ye idolaters, as were some of them, as it is written:(1) The people sat down to eat and drink, and  rose up to play. Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them also did, and fell in one day  three and twenty thousand. Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were  destroyed of serpents. Neither murmur ye, as some of them murmured, and were destroyed of the  destroyer. But all these things happened to them in a figure, and were written for our admonition,  upon whom the end of the world (saeculorum) is come. Wherefore let him that thinketh he  standeth, take heed lest he fall."(2)

4. Since therefore, beyond all doubt and contradiction, the apostle shows that there is one and  the same God, who did both enter into judgment with these former things, and who does inquire  into those of the present time, and points out why these things have been committed to writing; all  these men are found to be unlearned and presumptuous, nay, even destitute of common sense, who,  because of the transgressions of them of old time, and because of the disobedience of a vast number  of them, do allege that there was indeed one God of these men, and that He was the maker of the  world, and existed in a state of degeneracy; but that there was another Father declared by Christ,  and that this Being is He who has been conceived by the mind of each of them; not understanding  that as, in the former case, God showed Himself not well pleased in many stances towards those  who sinned, so also in the latter, "many are called, but few are chosen."(3) As then the unrighteous,  the idolaters, and fornicators perished, so also is it now: for both the Lord declares, that such  persons are sent into eternal fire;(4) and the apostle says, "Know ye not that the unrighteous shall  not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers,  not effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards,  nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God."(5) And as it was not to those who  are without that he said these things, but to us. lest we should be cast forth from the kingdom of  God, by doing any such thing, he proceeds to say, "And such indeed were ye; but ye are washed,  but ye are sanctified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the Spirit of our God." And just  as then, those who led vicious lives, and put other people astray, were condemned and cast out, so  also even now the offending eye is plucked out, and the foot and the hand, lest the rest of the body  perish in like manner.(6)

And we have the precept: "If any man that is called a brother be a  fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner, with such an one  no not to eat."(7) And again does the apostle say, "Let no man deceive you with vain words; for  because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the sons of mistrust. Be not ye therefore par- takers with them."(8) And as then the condemnation of sinners extended to others who approved of  them, and joined in their society; so also is it the case at present, that "a little leaven leaveneth the  whole lump."(9) And as the wrath of God did then descend upon the unrighteous, here also does  the apostle likewise say: "For the wrath of God shall be revealed from heaven against all  ungodliness and unrighteousness of those men who hold back the truth in unrighteousness."(10)  And as, in those times, vengeance came from God upon the Egyptians who were subjecting Israel  to unjust punishment, so is it now, the Lord truly declaring, "And shall not God avenge His own  elect, which cry day and night unto Him? I tell you, that He will avenge them speedily."(11) So  says the apostle, in like manner, in the Epistle to the Thessalonians: "Seeing it is a righteous thing  with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you; and to you who are troubled rest with  us, at the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ from heaven with His mighty angels, and in a flame of  fire, to take vengeance upon those who know not God, and upon those that obey not the Gospel of  our Lord Jesus Christ: who shall also be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of  the Lord, and from the glory of His power; when He shall come to be glorified in His saints, and to  be admired in all them who have believed in Him."(1)

CHAP. XXVIII.--THOSE PERSONS PROVE THEMSELVES SENSELESS WHO EXAGGERATE THE MERCY OF CHRIST, BUT ARE SILENT AS TO THE JUDGMENT, AND  LOOK ONLY AT THE MORE ABUNDANT GRACE OF THE NEW TESTAMENT; BUT,  FORGETFUL OF THE GREATER DEGREE OF PERFECTION WHICH IT DEMANDS FROM  US, THEY ENDEAVOUR TO SHOW THAT THERE IS ANOTHER GOD BEYOND HIM WHO  CREATED THE WORLD.

1. Inasmuch, then, as in both Testaments there is the same righteousness of God [displayed]  when God takes vengeance, in the one case indeed typically, temporarily, and more moderately; but  in the other, really, enduringly, and more rigidly: for the fire is eternal, and the wrath of God  which shall be revealed from heaven from the face of our Lord (as David also says, "But the face of  the Lord is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth"(2)),  entails a heavier punishment on those who incur it,--the ciders pointed out that those men are  devoid of sense, who, [arguing] from what happened to those who formerly did not obey God, do  endeavour to bring in another Father, setting over against [these punishments] what great things  the Lord had done at His coming to save th