|
526
IRENAEUS AGAINST HERESIES
BOOK V.
PREFACE.
IN the four preceding books, my very dear friend, which I
put forth to thee, all the heretics have been exposed, and their
doctrines brought to light, and these men refuted who have devised
irreligious opinions. [I have accomplished this by adducing] something
from the doctrine peculiar to each of these men, which they have
left in their writings, as well as by using arguments of a more
general nature, and applicable to them all.(1) Then I have pointed
out the truth, and shown the preaching of the Church, which the
prophets proclaimed (as I have already demonstrated), but which
Christ brought to perfection, and the apostles have handed down,
from whom the Church, receiving [these truths], and throughout
all the world alone preserving them in their integrity (bene),
has transmitted them to her sons. Then also--having disposed of
all questions which the heretics propose to us, and having explained
the doctrine of the apostles, and clearly set forth many of those
things which were said and done by the Lord in parables--I shall
endeavour, in this the fifth book of the entire work which treats
of the exposure and refutation of knowledge falsely so called,
to exhibit proofs from the rest of the Lord's doctrine and the
apostolical epistles: [thus] complying with thy demand, as thou
didst request of me (since indeed I have been assigned a place
in the ministry of the word); and, labouring by every means in
my power to furnish thee with large assistance against the contradictions
of the heretics, as also to reclaim the wanderers
and convert them to the Church of God, to confirm at the same
time the minds of the neophytes, that they may preserve stedfast
the faith which they have received, guarded by the Church in its
integrity, in order that they be in no way perverted by those
who endeavour to teach
them false doctrines, and lead them away from the truth. It will
be incumbent upon thee, however, and all who may happen to read
this writing, to peruse with great attention what I have already
said, that thou mayest obtain a knowledge of the subjects against
which I am contending. For it is thus that thou wilt both controvert
them in a legitimate manner, and wilt be prepared to receive the
proofs brought forward against them, casting away their doctrines
as filth by means of the celestial faith; but following the only
true and stedfast Teacher, the Word of God, our Lord Jesus Christ,
who did, through His transcendent love, become what we are, that
He might bring us to be even what He is Himself.
CHAP. I.--CHRIST ALONE IS ABLE TO TEACH DIVINE THINGS, AND
TO REDEEM US: HE, THE SAME, TOOK FLESH OF THE VIRGIN MARY, NOT
MERELY IN APPEARANCE, BUT ACTUALLY, BY THE OPERATION OF THE HOLY
SPIRIT, IN ORDER TO RENOVATE US. STRICTURES ON THE CONCEITS OF
VALENTINUS AND EBION.
1. FOR in no other way could we have learned the things of
God, unless our Master, existing as the Word, had become man.
For no other being had the power of revealing to us the things
of the Father, except His own proper Word. For what other person
"knew the mind of the Lord," or who else "has become
His counsellor?"(2) Again, we could have learned in no other
way than by seeing our Teacher, and hearing His voice with our
own ears, that, having become imitators of His works as well as
doers of His words, we may have communion with Him, receiving
increase from the perfect One, and from Him who is prior to all
creation. We--who were but lately created by the only best and
good Being, by Him also who has the gift of immortality, having
been formed after
527
His likeness (predestinated, according to the prescience of the
Father, that we, who had as yet no existence, might come into
being), and made the first-fruits of creation(1)--have received,
in the times known beforehand, [the blessings of salvation] according
to the ministration of the Word, who is perfect in all things,
as the mighty Word, and very man, who, redeeming us by His own
blood in a manner consonant to reason, gave Himself as a redemption
for those who had been led into captivity. And since the apostasy
tyrannized over us unjustly, and, though we were by nature the
property of the omnipotent God, alienated us contrary to nature,
rendering us its own disciples, the Word of God, powerful in all
things, and not defective with regard to His own justice, did
righteously turn against that apostasy, and redeem from it His
own property, not by violent means, as the [apostasy] had obtained
dominion over us at the beginning, when it insatiably snatched
away what was not its own, but by means of persuasion, as became
a God of counsel, who does not use violent means to obtain what
He desires; so that neither should justice be infringed upon,
nor the ancient handiwork of God go to destruction. Since the
Lord thus has redeemed us through His own blood, giving His soul
for our souls, and His flesh for our flesh,(2) and has also poured
out the Spirit of the Father for the union and communion of God
and man, imparting indeed God to men by means of the Spirit, and,
on the other hand, attaching man to God by His own incarnation,
and bestowing upon us at His coming immortality durably and truly,
by means of communion with God,--all the doctrines of the heretics
fall to ruin.
2. Vain indeed are those who allege that He appeared in mere
seeming. For these things were not done in appearance only, but
in actual reality. But if He did appear as a man, when He was
not a man, neither could the Holy Spirit have rested upon Him,--an
occurrence which did actually take place--as the Spirit is invisible;
nor, [in that case], was there any degree of truth in Him, for
He was not that which He seemed to be. But I have already remarked
that Abraham and the other prophets beheld Him after a prophetical
manner, foretelling in vision what should come to pass. If, then,
such a being has now appeared in outward semblance different from
what he was in reality, there has been a certain prophetical vision
made to men; and another advent of His must be looked forward
to, in which He shall be such as He has now been seen in a prophetic
manner. And I have proved already, that it is the same thing to
say that He appeared merely to outward seeming,
and [to affirm] that He received nothing from Mary. For He would
not have been one truly possessing flesh and blood, by which He
redeemed us, unless He had summed up in Himself the ancient formation
of Adam. Vain therefore are the disciples of Valentinus who put
forth this opinion,
in order that they my exclude the flesh from salvation, and cast
aside what God has fashioned.
3. Vain also are the Ebionites, who do not receive by faith
into their soul the union of God and man, but who remain in the
old leaven of [the natural] birth, and who do not choose to understand
that the Holy Ghost came upon Mary, and the power of the Most
High did overshadow her:(3) wherefore also what was generated
is a holy thing, and the Son of the Most High God the Father of
all, who effected the incarnation of this being, and showed forth
a new [kind of] generation; that as by the former generation we
inherited death, so by this new generation we might inherit life.
Therefore do these men reject the commixture of the heavenly wine,(4)
and wish it to be water of the world only, not receiving God so
as to have union with Him, but they remain in that Adam who had
been conquered and was expelled from Paradise: not considering
that as, at the beginning of our formation in Adam, that breath
of life which proceeded from God, having been united to what had
been fashioned, animated the man, and manifested him as a being
endowed with reason; so also, in [the times of] the end, the Word
of the Father and the Spirit of God, having become united with
the ancient substance of Adam's formation, rendered man living
and perfect, receptive of the perfect Father, in order that as
in the natural [Adam] we all were dead, so in the spiritual we
may all be made alive.(5) For never at any time did Adam escape
the harms(6) of God, to whom the Father speaking, said, "Let
Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness." And for this
reason in the last times (fine), not by the will of the flesh,
nor by the will of man, but by the good pleasure of the Father,(7)
His hands formed a living man, in order that Adam might be created
[again] after the image and likeness of God.
CHAP. II.--WHEN CHRIST VISITED US IN HIS GRACE, HE DID NOT
COME TO WHAT DID NOT BELONG TO HIM: ALSO, BY SHEDDING HIS TRUE
BLOOD FOR US, AND EXHIBITING TO US HIS TRUE FLESH IN THE EUCHARIST,
HE CONFERRED UPON OUR FLESH THE CAPACITY OF SALVATION.
1. And vain likewise are those who say that
528
God came to those things which did not belong to Him, as if covetous
of another's property; in order that He might deliver up that
man who had been created by another, to that God who had neither
made nor formed anything, but who also was deprived from the beginning
of His own proper formation of men. The advent, therefore, of
Him whom these men represent as coming to the things of others,
was not righteous; nor did He truly redeem us by His own blood,
if He did not really become man, restoring to His own handiwork
what was said [of it] in the beginning, that man was made after
the image and likeness of God; not snatching away by stratagem
the property of another, but taking possession of His own in a
righteous and gracious manner. As far as concerned the apostasy,
indeed, He redeems us righteously from it by His own blood; but
as regards us who have been redeemed, [He does this] graciously.
For we have given nothing to Him previously, nor does He desire
anything from us, as if He stood in need of it; but we do stand
in need of fellowship with Him. And for this reason it was that
He graciously poured Himself out, that He might gather us into
the bosom of the Father.
2. But vain in every respect are they who despise the entire
dispensation of God, and disallow the salvation of the flesh,
and treat with contempt its regeneration, maintaining that it
is not capable of incorruption. But if this indeed do not attain
salvation, then neither did the Lord redeem us with His blood,
nor is the cup of the Eucharist the communion of His blood, nor
the bread which we break the communion of His body.(1) For blood
can only come from veins and flesh, and whatsoever else makes
up the substance of man, such as the Word of God was actually
made. By His own blood he redeemed us, as also His apostle declares,
"In whom we have redemption through His blood, even the remission
of sins."(2) And as we are His members, we are also nourished
by means of the creation (and He Himself grants the creation to
us, for He causes His sun to rise, and sends rain when He wills(3)).
He has acknowledged the cup (which is a part of the creation)
as His own blood, from which He bedews our blood; and the bread
(also a part of the creation) He has established as His own body,
from which He gives increase to our bodies.(4)
3. When, therefore, the mingled cup and the manufactured bread
receives the Word of God, and the Eucharist of the blood and the
body of
Christ is made,(5) from which things the substance of our flesh
is increased and supported, how can they affirm that the flesh
is incapable of receiving the gift of God, which is life eternal,
which [flesh] is nourished from the body and blood of the Lord,
and is a member of Him?--even as the blessed Paul declares in
his Epistle to the Ephesians, that "we are members of His
body, of His flesh, and of His bones."(6) He does not speak
these words of some spiritual and invisible man, for a spirit
has not bones nor flesh;(7) but [he refers to] that dispensation
[by which the Lord became] an actual man, consisting of flesh,
and nerves, and bones,--that [flesh] which is nourished by the
cup which is His blood, and receives increase from the bread which
is His body. And just as a cutting from the vine planted in the
ground fructifies in its season, or as a corn of wheat falling
into the earth and becoming decomposed, rises with manifold increase
by the Spirit of God, who contains all things, and then, through
the wisdom of God, serves for the use of men, and having received
the Word of God, becomes the Eucharist, which is the body and
blood of Christ; so also our bodies, being nourished by it, and
deposited in the earth, and suffering decomposition there, shall
rise at their appointed time, the Word of God granting them resurrection
to the glory of God, even the Father, who freely gives to this
mortal immortality, and to this corruptible incorruption,(8) because
the strength of God is made perfect in weakness,(9) in order that
we may never become puffed up, as if we had life from ourselves,
and exalted against God, our minds becoming ungrateful; but learning
by experience that we possess eternal duration from the excelling
power of this Being, not from our own nature, we may neither undervalue
that glory which surrounds God as He is, nor be ignorant of our
own nature, but that we may know what God can effect, and what
benefits man receives, and thus never wander from the true comprehension
of things as they are, that is, both with regard to God and with
regard to man. And might it not be the case, perhaps, as I have
already observed, that for this purpose God permitted our resolution
into the common dust of mortality,(10) that we, being instructed
by every mode, may be accurate in all things for the future, being
ignorant neither of God nor of ourselves?
529
CHAP. III.--HE POWER AND GLORY OF GOD SHINE FORTH IN THE WEAKNESS
OF HUMAN FLESH, AS HE WILL RENDER OUR BODY A PARTICIPATOR OF THE
RESURRECTION AND OF IMMORTALITY, ALTHOUGH HE HAS FORMED IT FROM
THE DUST OF THE EARTH; HE WILL ALSO BESTOW UPON IT THE ENJOYMENT
OF IMMORTALITY, JUST AS HE GRANTS IT THIS SHORT LIFE IN COMMON
WITH THE SOUL.
1. The Apostle Paul has, moreover, in the most lucid manner,
pointed out that man has been delivered over to his own infirmity,
lest, being uplifted, he might fall away from the truth. Thus
he says in the second [Epistle] to the Corinthians: "And
lest I should be lifted up by the sublimity of the revelations,
there was given unto me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of
Satan to buffet me. And upon this I besought the Lord three times,
that it might depart from me. But he said unto me, My grace is
sufficient for thee; for strength is made perfect in weakness.
Gladly therefore shall I rather glory in infirmities, that the
power of Christ may dwell in me."(1) What, therefore? (as
some may exclaim:) did the Lord wish, in that case, that His apostles
should thus undergo buffering, and that he should endure such
infirmity? Even so it was; the word says it. For strength is made
perfect in weakness, rendering him a better man who by means of
his infirmity becomes acquainted with the power of God. For how
could a man have learned that he is himself an infirm being, and
mortal by nature, but that God is immortal and powerful, unless
he had learned by experience what is in both? For there is nothing
evil in learning one's infirmities by endurance; yea, rather,
it has even the beneficial effect of preventing him from forming
an undue opinion of his own nature (non aberrare in natura sua).
But the being lifted up against God, and taking His glory to one's
self, rendering man ungrateful, has brought much evil upon him.
[And thus, I say, man must learn both things by experience], that
he may not be destitute of truth and love either towards himself
or his Creator.(2) But the experience of both confers upon him
the true knowledge as to God and man, and increases his love towards
God. Now, where there exists an increase of love, there a greater
glory is wrought out by the power of God for those who love Him.
2. Those men, therefore, set aside the power of God, and do
not consider what the word declares, when they dwell upon the
infirmity of the flesh, but do not take into consideration the
power of Him who raises it up from the dead. For if He does not
vivify what is mortal, and does not bring back the corruptible
to incorruption, He is not a God of power. But that He is powerful
in all these respects, we ought to perceive from our origin, inasmuch
as God, taking dust from the earth, formed man. And surely it
is much more difficult and incredible, from non-existent bones,
and nerves, and veins, and the rest of man's organization, to
bring it about that all this should be, and to make man an animated
and rational creature, than to re-integrate again that which had
been created and then afterwards decomposed into earth (for the
reasons already mentioned), having thus passed into those [elements]
from which man, who had no previous existence, was formed. For
He who in the beginning caused him to have being who as yet was
not, just when He pleased, shall much more reinstate again those
who had a former existence, when it is His will [that they should
inherit] the life granted by Him. And that flesh shall also be
found fit for and capable of receiving the power of God, which
at the beginning received the skilful touches of God; so that
one part became the eye for seeing; another, the ear for hearing;
another, the hand for feeling and working; another, the sinews
stretched out everywhere, and holding the limbs together; another,
arteries and veins, passages for the blood and the air;(3) another,
the various internal organs; another, the blood, which is the
bond of union between soul and body. But why go [on in this strain]?
Numbers would fail to express the multiplicity of parts in the
human frame, which was made in no other way than by the great
wisdom of God. But those things which partake of the skill and
wisdom of God, do also partake of His power.
3. The flesh, therefore, is not destitute [of participation]
in the constructive wisdom and power of God. But if the power
of Him who is the bestower of life is made perfect in weakness--that
is, in the flesh--let them inform us, when they maintain the incapacity
of flesh to receive the life granted by God, whether they do say
these things as being living men at present, and partakers of
life, or acknowledge that, having no part in life whatever, they
are at the present moment dead men. And if they really are dead
men, how is it that they move about, and speak, and perform those
other functions which are not the actions of the dead, but of
the living? But if they are now alive, and if their whole body
partakes of life, how can they venture the assertion that the
flesh is not quali-
530
fled to be a partaker of life, when they do confess that they
have life at the present moment? It is just as if anybody were
to take up a sponge full of water, or a torch on fire, and to
declare that the sponge could not possibly partake of the water,
or the torch of the fire. In this very manner do those men, by
alleging that they are alive and bear life about in their members,
contradict themselves afterwards, when they represent these members
as not being capable of [receiving] life. But if the present temporal
life, which is of such an inferior nature to eternal life, can
nevertheless effect so much as to quicken our mortal members,
why should not eternal life, being much more powerful than this,
vivify the flesh, which has already held converse with, and been
accustomed to sustain, life? For that the flesh can really partake
of life, is shown from the fact of it; being alive; for it lives
on, as long as it is God's purpose that it should do so. It is
manifest, too, that God has the power to confer life upon it,
inasmuch as He grants life to us who are in existence. And, therefore,
since the Lord has power to infuse life into what He has fashioned,
and since the flesh is capable of being quickened, what remains
to prevent its participating in incorruption, which is a blissful
and never-ending life granted by God?
CHAP. IV.--THOSE PERSONS ARE DECEIVED WHO FEIGN ANOTHER GOD
THE FATHER BESIDES THE CREATOR OF THE WORLD; FOR HE MUST HAVE
BEEN FEEBLE AND USELESS, OR ELSE MALIGNANT AND FULL OF ENVY, IF
HE BE EITHER UNABLE OR UNWILLING TO EXTEND EXTERNAL LIFE TO OUR
BODIES.
1. Those persons who feign the existence of another Father
beyond the Creator, and who term him the good God, do deceive
themselves; for they introduce him as a feeble, worthless, and
negligent being, not to say malign and full of envy, inasmuch
as they affirm that our bodies are not quickened by him. For when
they say of things which it is manifest to all do remain immortal,
such as the spirit and the soul, and such other things, that they
are quickened by the Father, but that another thing [viz. the
body] which is quickened in no different manner than by God granting
[life] to it, is abandoned by life,--[they must either confess]
that this proves their Father to be weak and powerless, or else
envious and malignant. For since the Creator does even here quicken
our mortal bodies, and promises them resurrection by the prophets,
as I have pointed out; who [in that case] is shown to be more
powerful, stronger, or truly good? Whether is it the Creator who
vivifies the whole man, or is it their Father, falsely so called?
He feigns to be the quickener of those things which are immortal
by nature, to which things life is always present by their very
nature; but he does not benevolently quicken those things which
required his assistance, that they might live, but leaves them
carelessly to fall under the power of death. Whether is it the
case, then, that their Father does not bestow life upon them when
he has the power of so doing, or is it that he does not possess
the power? If, on the one hand, it is because he cannot, he is,
upon that supposition, not a powerful being, nor is he more perfect
than the Creator; for the Creator grants, as we must perceive,
what He is unable to afford. But if, on the other hand, [it be
that he does not grant this] when he has the power of so doing,
then he is proved to be not a good, but an envious and malignant
Father.
2. If, again, they refer to any cause on account of which
their Father does not impart life to bodies, then that cause must
necessarily appear superior to the Father, since it restrains
Him from the exercise of His benevolence; and His benevolence
will thus be proved weak, on account of that cause which they
bring forward. Now every one must perceive that bodies are capable
of receiving life. For they live to the extent that God pleases
that they should live; and that being so, the [heretics] cannot
maintain that [these bodies] are utterly incapable of receiving
life. If, therefore, on account of necessity and any other cause,
those [bodies] which are capable of participating in life are
not vivified, their Father shall be the slave of necessity and
that cause, and not therefore a free agent, having His will under
His own control.
CHAP. V.--THE PROLONGED LIFE OF THE ANCIENTS, THE TRANSLATION
OF ELIJAH AND OF ENOCH IN THEIR OWN BODIES, AS WELL AS THE PRESERVATION
OF JONAH, OF SHADRACH, MESHACH, AND ABEDNEGO, IN THE MIDST OF
EXTREME PERIL, ARE CLEAR DEMONSTRATIONS THAT GOD CAN RAISE UP
OUR BODIES TO LIFE ETERNAL.
1. [In order to learn] that bodies did continue in existence
for a lengthened period, as long as it was God's good pleasure
that they should flourish, let [these heretics] read the Scriptures,
and they will find that our predecessors advanced beyond seven
hundred, eight hundred, and nine hundred years of age; and that
their bodies kept pace with the protracted length of their days,
and participated in life as long as God willed that they should
live. But why do I refer to these men? For Enoch, when he pleased
God, was translated in the same body in which he did please Him,
thus pointing out by anticipation the translation of the just.
Elijah, too, was caught up [when he was yet] in the substance
of the [natural] form; thus exhibiting in prophecy the
531
assumption of those who are spiritual, and that nothing stood
in the way of their body being translated and caught up. For by
means of the very same hands through which they were moulded at
the beginning, did they receive this translation and assumption.
For in Adam the hands of God had become accustomed to set in order,
to rule, and to sustain His own workmanship, and to bring it and
place it where they pleased. Where, then, was the first man placed?
In paradise certainly, as the Scripture declares "And God
planted a garden [paradisum] eastward in Eden, and there He placed
the man whom He had formed."(1) And then afterwards when
[man] proved disobedient, he was cast out thence into this world.
Wherefore also the elders who were disciples of the apostles tell
us that those who were translated were transferred to that place
(for paradise has been prepared for righteous men, such as have
the Spirit; in which place also Paul the apostle, when he was
caught up, heard words which are unspeakable as regards us in
our present condition(2)), and that there shall they who have
been translated remain until the consummation [of all things],
as a prelude to immortality.
2. If, however, any one imagine it impossible that men should
survive for such a length of time, and that Elias was not caught
up in the flesh, but that his flesh was consumed in the fiery
chariot, let him consider that Jonah, when he had been cast into
the deep, and swallowed down into the whale's belly, was by the
command of God again thrown out safe upon the land.(3) And then,
again, when Ananias, Azarias, and Misael were cast into the furnace
of fire sevenfold heated, they sustained no harm whatever, neither
was the smell of fire perceived upon them. As, therefore, the
hand of God was present with them, working out marvellous things
in their case--[things] impossible [to be accomplished] by man's
nature--what wonder was it, if also in the case of those who were
translated it performed something wonderful, working in obedience
to the will of God, even the Father? Now this is the Son of God,
as the Scripture represents Nebuchadnezzar the king as having
said, "Did not we cast three men bound into the furnace?
and, lo, I do see four walking in the midst of the fire, and the
fourth is like the Son of God."(4) Neither the nature of
any created thing, therefore, nor the weakness of the flesh, can
prevail against the will of God. For God is not subject to created
things, but created things to God; and all things yield obedience
to His will. Wherefore also the Lord declares, "The things
which are impossible with men, are possible with God."(5)
As, therefore, it might seem to the men of the present day, who
are ignorant of God's appointment, to be a thing incredible and
impossible that any man could live for such a number of years,
yet those who were before us did live [to such an age], and those
who were translated do live as an earnest of the future length
of days; and [as it might also appear impossible] that from the
whale's belly and from the fiery furnace men issued forth unhurt,
yet they nevertheless did so, led forth as it were by the hand
of God, for the purpose of declaring His power: so also now, although
some, not knowing the power and promise of God, may oppose their
own salvation, deeming it impossible for God, who raises up the
dead; to have power to confer upon them eternal duration, yet
the scepticism of men of this stamp shall not render the faithfulness
of God of none effect.
CHAP. VI.--GOD WILL BESTOW SALVATION UPON THE WHOLE NATURE OF
MAN, CONSISTING OF BODY AND SOUL IN CLOSE UNION, SINCE THE WORD
TOOK IT UPON HIM, AND ADORNED WITH THE GIFTS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT,
OF WHOM OUR BODIES ARE, AND ARE TERMED, THE TEMPLES.
1. Now God shall be glorified in His handiwork, fitting it
so as to be conformable to, and modelled after, His own Son. For
by the hands of the Father, that is, by the Son and the Holy Spirit,
man, and not [merely] a part of man, was made in the likeness
of God. Now the soul and the spirit are certainly a part of the
man, but certainly not the man; for the perfect man consists in
the commingling and the union of the soul receiving the spirit
of the Father, and the admixture of that fleshly nature which
was moulded after the image of God. For this reason does the apostle
declare, "We speak wisdom among them that are perfect,"(6)
terming those persons "perfect" who have received the
Spirit of God, and who through the Spirit of God do speak in all
languages, as he used Himself also to speak. In like manner we
do also hear many brethren in the Church, who possess prophetic
gifts, and who through the Spirit speak all kinds of languages,
and bring to light for the general benefit the hidden things of
men, and declare the mysteries of God, whom also the apostle terms
"spiritual," they being spiritual because they partake
of the Spirit, and not because their flesh has been stripped off
and taken away, and because they have become purely spiritual.
For if any one take away the sub-
532
stance of flesh, that is, of the handiwork [of God], and understand
that which is purely spiritual, such then would not be a spiritual
man but would be the spirit of a man, or the Spirit of God. But
when the spirit here blended with the soul is united to [God's]
handiwork, the man is rendered spiritual and perfect because of
the outpouring of the Spirit, and this is he who was made in the
image and likeness of God. But if the Spirit be wanting to the
soul, he who is such is indeed of an animal nature, and being
left carnal, shall be an imperfect being, possessing indeed the
image [of God] in his formation (in plasmate), but not receiving
the similitude through the Spirit; and thus is this being imperfect.
Thus also, if any one take away the image and set aside the handiwork,
he cannot then understand this as being a man, but as either some
part of a man, as I have already said, or as something else than
a man. For that flesh which has been moulded is not a perfect
man in itself, but the body of a man, and part of a man. Neither
is the soul itself, considered apart by itself, the man; but it
is the soul of a man, and part of a man. Neither is the spirit
a man, for it is called the spirit, and not a man; but the commingling
and union of all these constitutes the perfect man. And for this
cause does the apostle, explaining himself, make it clear that
the saved man is a complete man as well as a spiritual man; saying
thus in the first Epistle to the Thessalonians, "Now the
God of peace sanctify you perfect (perfectos); and may your spirit,
and soul, and body be preserved whole without complaint to the
coming of the Lord Jesus Christ."(1) Now what was his object
in praying that these three--that is, soul, body, and spirit--
might be preserved to the coming of the Lord, unless he was aware
of the [future] reintegration and union of the three, and [that
they should be heirs of] one and the same salvation? For this
cause also he declares that those are "the perfect"
who present unto the Lord the three [component parts] without
offence. Those, then, are the perfect who have had the Spirit
of God remaining in them, and have preserved their souls and bodies
blameless, holding fast the faith of God, that is, that faith
which is [directed] towards God, and maintaining righteous dealings
with respect to their neighbours.
2. Whence also he says, that this handiwork is "the temple
of God," thus declaring: "Know ye not that ye are the
temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If
any man, therefore, will defile the temple of God, him will God
destroy: for the temple of God is holy, which [temple] ye are."(2)
Here he manifestly declares the body to be the temple in which
the Spirit dwells. As also the Lord speaks in reference to Himself,
"Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.
He spake this, however," it is said, "of the temple
of His body."(3) And not only does he (the apostle) acknowledge
our bodies to be a temple, but even the temple of Christ, saying
thus to the Corinthians, "Know ye not that your bodies are
members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ, and
make them the members of an harlot?"(4) He speaks these things,
not in reference to some other spiritual man; for a being of such
a nature could have nothing to do with an harlot: but he declares
"our body," that is, the flesh which continues in sanctity
and purity, to be "the members of Christ;" but that
when it becomes one with an harlot, it becomes the members of
an harlot. And for this reason he said, "If any man defile
the temple of God, him will God destroy." How then is it
not the utmost blasphemy to allege, that the temple of God, in
which the Spirit of the Father dwells, and the members of Christ,
do not partake of salvation, but are reduced to perdition? Also,
that our bodies are raised not from their own substance, but by
the power of God, he says to the Corinthians, "Now the body
is not for fornication, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the
body. But God hath both raised up the Lord, and shall raise us
up by His own power."(5)
CHAP. VII.--INASMUCH AS CHRIST DID RISE IN OUR FLESH, IT FOLLOWS
THAT WE SHALL BE ALSO RAISED IN THE SAME; SINCE THE RESURRECTION
PROMISED TO US SHOULD NOT BE REFERRED TO SPIRITS NATURALLY IMMORTAL,
BUT TO BODIES IN THEMSELVES MORTAL.
1. In the same manner, therefore, as Christ did rise in the
substance of flesh, and pointed out to His disciples the mark
of the nails and the opening in His side(6) (now these are the
tokens of that flesh which rose from the dead), so "shall
He also," it is said, "raise us up by His own power."(7)
And again to the Romans he says, "But if the Spirit of Him
that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised
up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies."(8)
What, then, are mortal bodies? Can they be souls? Nay, for souls
are incorporeal when put in comparison with mortal bodies; for
God "breathed into the face of man the breath of life, and
man became a living soul." Now the breath of life is an incorporeal
533
thing. And certainly they cannot maintain that the very breath
of life is mortal. Therefore David says, "My soul also shall
live to Him,"(1) just as if its substance were immortal.
Neither, on the other hand, can they say that the spirit is the
mortal body. What therefore is there left to which we may apply
the term "mortal body," unless it be the thing that
was moulded, that is, the flesh, of which it is also said that
God will vivify it? For this it is which dies and is decomposed,
but not the soul or the spirit. For to die is to lose vital power,
and to become henceforth breathless, inanimate, and devoid of
motion, and to melt away into those [component parts] from which
also it derived the commencement of [its] substance. But this
event happens neither to the soul, for it is the breath of life;
nor to the spirit, for the spirit is simple and not composite,
so that it cannot be decomposed, and is itself the life of those
who receive it. We must therefore conclude that it is in reference
to the flesh that death is mentioned; which [flesh], after the
soul's departure, becomes breathless and inanimate, and is decomposed
gradually into the earth from which it was taken. This, then,
is what is mortal. And it is this of which he also says,"
He shall also quicken your mortal bodies." And therefore
in reference to it he says, in the first [Epistle] to the Corinthians:
"So also is the resurrection of the dead: it is sown in corruption,
it rises in incorruption."(2) For he declares, "That
which thou sowest cannot be quickened, unless first it die."(3)
2. But what is that which, like a grain of wheat, is sown
in the earth and decays, unless it be the bodies which are laid
in the earth, into which seeds are also cast? And for this reason
he said, "It is sown in dishonour, it rises in glory."(4)
For what is more ignoble than dead flesh? Or, on the other hand,
what is more glorious than the same when it arises and partakes
of incorruption? "It is sown in weakness, it is raised in
power:"(5) in its own weakness certainly, because since it
is earth it goes to earth; but [it is quickened] by the power
of God, who raises it from the dead. "It is sown an animal
body, it rises a spiritual body."(6) He has taught, beyond
all doubt, that such language was not used by him, either with
reference to the soul or to the spirit, but to bodies that have
become corpses. For these are animal bodies, that is, [bodies]
which partake of life, which when they have lost, they succumb
to death; then, rising through the Spirit's instrumentality, they
become spiritual bodies, so that by the Spirit they possess a
perpetual life. "For now," he says, "we know in
part, and we prophesy in part, but then face to face."(7)
And this it is which has been said also by Peter: "Whom having
not seen, ye love; in whom now also, not seeing, ye believe; and
believing, ye shall rejoice with joy unspeakable."(8) For
our face shall see the face of the Lord? and shall rejoice with
joy unspeakable,--that is to say, when it shall behold its own
Delight.
CHAP. VIII.--THE GIFTS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT WHICH WE RECEIVE PREPARE
US FOR INCORRUPTION, RENDER US SPIRITUAL, AND SEPARATE US FROM
CARNAL MEN. THESE TWO CLASSES ARE SIGNIFIED BY THE CLEAN AND
UNCLEAN ANIMALS IN THE LEGAL DISPENSATION.
1. But we do now receive a certain portion of His Spirit,
tending towards perfection, and preparing us for incorruption,
being little by little accustomed to receive and bear God; which
also the apostle terms "an earnest," that is, a part
of the honour which has been promised us by God, where he says
in the Epistle to the Ephesians, "In which ye also, having
heard the word of truth, the Gospel of your salvation, believing
in which we have been sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,
which is the earnest of our inheritance."(10) This earnest,
therefore, thus dwelling in us, renders us spiritual even now,
and the mortal is swallowed up by immortality.(11) "For ye,"
he declares, "are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if
so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you."(12) This, however
does not take place by a casting away of the flesh, but by the
impartation of the Spirit. For those to whom he was writing were
not without flesh, but they were those who had received the Spirit
of God, "by which we cry, Abba, Father."(13) If therefore,
at the present time, having the earnest, we do cry, "Abba,
Father," what shall it be when, on rising again, we behold
Him face to face; when all the members shall burst out into a
continuous hymn of triumph, glorifying Him who raised them from
the dead, and gave the gift of eternal life? For if the earnest,
gathering man into itself, does even now cause him to cry, "Abba,
Father," what shall the complete grace of the Spirit effect,
which shall be given to men by God? It will render us like unto
Him, and accomplish the will(14) of the Father; for it shall make
man after the image and likeness of God.
534
2. Those persons, then, who possess the earnest of the Spirit,
and who are not enslaved by the lusts of the flesh, but are subject
to the Spirit, and who in all things walk according to the light
of reason, does the apostle properly term "spiritual,"
because the Spirit of God dwells in them. Now, spiritual men shall
not be incorporeal spirits; but our substance, that is, the union
of flesh and spirit, receiving the Spirit of God, makes up the
spiritual man. But those who do indeed reject the Spirit's counsel,
and are the slaves of fleshly lusts, and lead lives contrary to
reason, and who, without restraint, plunge headlong into their
own desires, having no longing after the Divine Spirit, do live
after the manner of swine and of dogs; these men, [I say], does
the apostle very properly term "carnal," because they
have no thought of anything else except carnal things.
3. For the same reason, too, do the prophets compare them
to irrational animals, on account of the irrationality of their
conduct, saying, "They have become as horses raging for the
females; each one of them neighing after his neighbour's wife."(1)
And again, "Man, when he was in honour, was made like unto
cattle."(2) This denotes that, for his own fault, he is likened
to cattle, by rivalling their irrational life. And we also, as
the custom is, do designate men of this stamp as cattle and irrational
beasts.
4. Now the law has figuratively predicted all these, delineating
man by the [various] animals:(3) whatsoever of these, says [the
Scripture], have a double hoof and ruminate, it proclaims as clean;
but whatsoever of them do not possess one or other of these [properties],
it sets aside b themselves as unclean. Who then are the clean?
Those who make their way by faith steadily towards the Father
and the Son; for this is denoted by the steadiness of those which
divide the hoof; and they meditate day and night upon the words
of God,(4) that they may be adorned with good works: for this
is the meaning of the ruminants. The unclean, however, are those
which do neither divide the hoof nor ruminate; that is, those
persons who have neither faith in God, nor do meditate on His
words: and such is the abomination of the Gentiles. But as to
those animals which do indeed chew the cud, but have not the double
hoof, and are themselves unclean, we have in them a figurative
description of the Jews, who certainly have the words of God in
their mouth, but who do not fix their rooted stedfastness in the
Father and in the Son; wherefore they are an unstable generation.
For those animals which have the hoof all in one piece easily
slip; but those which have it divided are more sure-footed, their
cleft hoofs succeeding each other as they advance, and the one
hoof supporting the other. In like manner, too, those are unclean
which have the double hoof but do not ruminate: this is plainly
an indication of all heretics, and of those who do not meditate
on the words of God, neither are adorned with works of righteousness;
to whom also the Lord says, "Why call ye Me Lord, Lord, and
do not the things which I say to you?"(5) For men of this
stamp do indeed say that they believe in the Father and the Son,
but they never meditate as they should upon the things of God,
neither are they adorned with works of righteousness; but, as
I have already observed, they have adopted the lives of swine
and of dogs, giving themselves over to filthiness, to gluttony,
and recklessness of all sorts. Justly, therefore, did the apostle
call all such "carnal" and "animal,"(6)--[all
those, namely], who through their own unbelief and luxury do not
receive the Divine Spirit, and in their various phases east out
from themselves the life-giving Word, and walk stupidly after
their own lusts: the prophets, too, spake of them as beasts of
burden and wild beasts; custom likewise has viewed them in the
light of cattle and irrational creatures; and the law has pronounced
them unclean.
CHAP. IX.--SHOWING HOW THAT PASSAGE OF THE APOSTLE WHICH THE HERETICS
PERVERT, SHOULD BE UNDERSTOOD;VIZ., "FLESH AND BLOOD SHALL
NOT POSSESS THE KINGDOM OF GOD."
1. Among the other [truths] proclaimed by the apostle, there
is also this one, "That flesh and blood cannot inherit the
kingdom of God."(7) This is [the passage] which is adduced
by all the heretics in support of their folly, with an attempt
to annoy us, and to point out that the handiwork of God is not
saved. They do not take this fact into consideration, that there
are three things out of which, as I have shown, the complete man
is composed--flesh, soul, and spirit. One of these does indeed
preserve and fashion [the man]--this is the spirit; while as to
another it is united and formed--that is the flesh; then [comes]
that which is between these two--that is the soul, which sometimes
indeed, when it follows the spirit, is raised up by it, but sometimes
it sympathizes with the flesh, and falls into carnal lusts. Those
then, as many as they be, who have not that which saves and forms
[us] into life [eternal], shall be, and shall be called, [mere]
flesh and blood; for these are they
535
who have not the Spirit of God in themselves. Wherefore men of
this stamp are spoken of by the Lord as "dead;" for,
says He, "Let the dead bury their dead,"(1) because
they have not the Spirit which quickens man.
2. On the other hand, as many as fear God and trust in His
Son's advent, and who through faith do establish the Spirit of
God in their hearts,--such men as these shall be properly called
both "pure," and "spiritual," and "those
living to God," because they possess the Spirit of the Father,
who purifies man, and raises him up to the life of God. For as
the Lord has testified that "the flesh is weak," so
[does He also say] that "the spirit is willing."(2)
For this latter is capable of working out its own suggestions.
If, therefore, any one admix the ready inclination of the Spirit
to be, as it were, a stimulus to the infirmity of the flesh, it
inevitably follows that what is strong will prevail over the weak,
so that the weakness of the flesh will be absorbed by the strength
of the Spirit; and that the man in whom this takes place cannot
in that case be carnal, but Spiritual, because of the fellowship
of the Spirit. Thus it is, therefore, that the martyrs bear their
witness, and despise death, not after the infirmity of the flesh,
but because of the readiness of the Spirit. For when the infirmity
of the flesh is absorbed, it exhibits the Spirit as powerful;
and again, when the Spirit absorbs the weakness [of the flesh],
it possesses the flesh as an inheritance in itself, and from both
of these is formed a living man,--living, indeed, because he partakes
of the Spirit, but man, because of the substance of flesh.
3. The flesh, therefore, when destitute of the Spirit of God,
is dead, not having life, and cannot possess the kingdom of God:
[it is as] irrational blood, like water poured out upon the ground.
And therefore he says, "As is the earthy, such are they that
are earthy."(3) But where the Spirit of the Father is, there
is a living man; [there is] the rational blood preserved by God
for the avenging [of those that shed it]; [there is] the flesh
possessed by the Spirit, forgetful indeed of what belongs to it,
and adopting the quality of the Spirit, being made conformable
to the Word of God. And on this account he (the apostle) declares,
"As we have borne the image of him who is of the earth, we
shall also bear the image of Him who is from heaven."(4)
What, therefore, is the earthly? That which was fashioned. And
what is the heavenly? The Spirit. As therefore he says, when we
were destitute of the celestial Spirit, we walked in former times
in the oldness of the flesh, not obeying God; so now let us, receiving
the Spirit, walk in newness of life, obeying God. Inasmuch, therefore,
as without the Spirit of God we cannot be saved, the apostle exhorts
us through faith and chaste conversation to preserve the Spirit
of God, lest, having become non-participators of the Divine Spirit,
we lose the kingdom of heaven; and he exclaims, that flesh in
itself, and blood, cannot possess the kingdom God.
4. If, however, we must speak strictly, [we would say that]
the flesh does not inherit, but is inherited; as also the Lord
declares, "Blessed are the meek, for they shall possess the
earth by inheritance;"(5) as if in the [future] kingdom,
the earth, from whence exists the substance Of our flesh, is to
be possessed by inheritance. This is the reason for His wishing
the temple (i.e., the flesh) to be clean, that the Spirit of God
may take delight therein, as a bridegroom with a bride. As, therefore,
the bride cannot [be said] to wed, but to be wedded, when the
bridegroom comes and takes her, so also the flesh cannot by itself
possess the kingdom of God by inheritance; but it can be taken
for an inheritance into the kingdom of God. For a living person
inherits the goods of the deceased; and it is one thing to inherit,
another to be inherited. The former rules, and exercises power
over, and orders the things inherited at his will; but the latter
things are in a state of subjection, are under order, and are
ruled over by him who has obtained the inheritance. What, therefore,
is it that lives? The Spirit of God, doubtless. What, again, are
the possessions of the deceased? The various parts of the man,
surely, which rot in the earth. But these are inherited by the
Spirit when they are translated into the kingdom of heaven. For
this cause, too, did Christ die. that the Gospel covenant being
manifested and known to the whole world, might in the first place
set free His slaves; and then afterwards, as I have already shown,
might constitute them heirs of His property, when the Spirit possesses
them by inheritance. For he who lives inherits, but the flesh
is inherited. In order that we may not lose life by losing that
Spirit which possesses us, the apostle, exhorting us to the communion
of the Spirit, has said, according to reason, in those words already
quoted, "That flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom
of God." Just as if he were to say, "Do not err; for
unless the Word of God dwell with, and the Spirit of the Father
be in you, and if ye shall live frivolously and carelessly as
if ye were this only, viz., mere flesh and blood, ye cannot inherit
the kingdom of God."
536
CHAP. X.--BY A COMPARISON DRAWN FROM THE WILD OLIVE-TREE, WHOSE
QUALITY BUT NOT WHOSE NATURE IS CHANGED BY GRAFTING, HE PROVES
MORE IMPORTANT THINGS; HE POINTS OUT ALSO THAT MAN WITHOUT THE
SPIRIT IS NOT CAPABLE OF BRINGING FORTH FRUIT, OR OF INHERITING
THE KINGDOM OF GOD.
1. This truth, therefore, [he declares], in order that we
may not reject the engrafting of the Spirit while pampering the
flesh. "But thou, being a wild olive-tree," he says,
"hast been grafted into the good olive-tree, and been made
a partaker of the fatness of the olive-tree." As, therefore,
when the wild olive has been engrafted, if it remain in its former
condition, viz., a wild olive, it is "cut off, and cast into
the fire;"(2) but if it takes kindly to the graft, and is
changed into the good olive-tree, it becomes a fruit-bearing olive,
planted, as it were, in a king's park (paradiso): so likewise
men, if they do truly progress by faith towards better things,
and receive the Spirit of God, and bring forth the fruit thereof,
shall be spiritual, as being planted in the paradise of God. But
if they cast out the Spirit, and remain in their former condition,
desirous of being of the flesh rather than of the Spirit, then
it is very justly said with regard to men of this stamp, "That
flesh and blood shall not inherit the kingdom of God;"(3)
just as if any one were to say that the wild olive is not received
into the paradise of God. Admirably therefore does the apostle
exhibit our nature, and God's universal appointment, in his discourse
about flesh and blood and the wild olive. For as the good olive,
if neglected for a certain time, if left to grow wild and to
run to i wood, does itself become a wild olive; or again, if the
wild olive be carefully tended and grafted, it naturally reverts
to its former fruit-bearing condition: so men also, when they
become careless, and bring forth for fruit the lusts of the flesh
like woody produce, are rendered, by their own fault, unfruitful
in righteousness. For when men sleep, the enemy sows the material
of tares;(4) and for this cause did the Lord command His disciples
to be on the watch.(5) And again, those persons who are not bringing
forth the fruits of righteousness, and are, as it were, covered
over and lost among brambles, if they use diligence, and receive
the word of God as a graft,(6) arrive at the pristine nature of
man--that which was created after the image and likeness of God.
2. But as the engrafted wild olive does not certainly lose
the substance of its wood, but changes the quality of its fruit,
and receives another name, being now not a wild olive, but a fruit-bearing
olive, and is called so; so also, when man is grafted in by faith
and receives the Spirit of God, he certainly does not lose the
substance of flesh, but changes the quality of the fruit [brought
forth, i.e.,] of his works, and receives another name,(7) showing
that he has become changed for the better, being now not [mere]
flesh and blood, but a spiritual man, and is called such. Then,
again, as the wild olive, if it be not grafted in, remains useless
to its lord because of its woody quality, and is cut down as a
tree bearing no fruit, and cast into the fire; so also man, if
he does not receive through faith the engrafting of the Spirit,
remains in his old condition, and being [mere] flesh and blood,
he cannot inherit the kingdom of God. Rightly therefore does the
apostle declare, "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom
of God;"(8) and, "Those who are in the flesh cannot
please God:"(9) not repudiating [by these words] the substance
of flesh, but showing that into it the Spirit must be infused.(10)
And for this reason, he says, "This mortal must put on immortality,
and this corruptible must put on incorruption."(11) And again
he declares, "But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit,
if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you."(12) He sets
this forth still more plainly, where he says, "The body indeed
is dead, because of sin; but the Spirit is life, because of righteousness.
But if the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus from the dead dwell
in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken
your mortal bodies, because of His Spirit dwelling in you."(13)
And again he says, in the Epistle to the Romans, "For if
ye live after the flesh, ye shall die."(14) [Now by these
words] he does not prohibit them from living their lives in the
flesh, for he was himself in the flesh when he wrote to them;
but he cuts away the lusts of the flesh, those which bring death
upon a man. And for this reason he says in continuation, "But
if ye through the Spirit do mortify the works of the flesh, ye
shall live. For whosoever are led by the Spirit of God, these
are the sons of God."
CHAP. XI.--TREATS UPON THE ACTIONS OF CARNAL AND OF SPIRITUAL
PERSONS; ALSO, THAT THE SPIRITUAL CLEANSING IS NOT TO BE REFERRED
TO THE SUBSTANCE OF OUR BODIES, BUT TO THE MANNER OF OUR FORMER
LIFE.
1. [The apostle], foreseeing the wicked speeches of unbelievers,
has particularized the
537
works which he terms carnal; and he explains himself, lest any
room for doubt be left to those who do dishonestly pervert his
meaning, thus saying in the Epistle to the Galatians: "Now
the works of the flesh are manifest, which are adulteries, fornications,
uncleanness, luxuriousness, idolatries, witchcrafts,(1) hatreds,
contentions jealousies, wraths, emulations, animosities, irritable
speeches, dissensions, heresies, envyings, drunkenness, carousings,
and such like; of which I warn you, as also I have warned you,
that they who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of
God."(2) Thus does he point out to his hearers in a more
explicit manner what it is [he means when he declares], "Flesh
and blood shall not inherit the kingdom of God." For they
who do these things, since they do indeed walk after the flesh,
have not the power of living unto God. And then, again, he proceeds
to tell us the spiritual actions which vivify a man, that is,
the engrafting of the Spirit; thus saying, "But the fruit
of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, goodness, benignity,
faith, meekness, continence, chastity: against these there is
no law."(3) As, therefore, he who has gone forward to the
better things, and has brought forth the fruit of the Spirit,
is saved altogether because of the communion of the Spirit; so
also he who has continued in the aforesaid works of the flesh,
being truly reckoned as carnal, because he did not receive the
Spirit of God, shall not have power to inherit the kingdom of
heaven. As, again, the same apostle testifies, saying to the Corinthians,
"Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom
of God? Do not err," he says: "neither fornicators,
nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of
themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor revilers,
nor rapacious persons, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And these
ye indeed have been; but ye have been washed, but ye have been
sanctified, but ye have been justified in the name of the Lord
Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God."(4) He shows
in the clearest manner through what things it is that man goes
to destruction, if he has continued to live after the flesh; and
then, on the other hand, [he points out] through what things he
is saved. Now he says that the things which save are the name
of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Spirit of our God.
2. Since, therefore, in that passage he recounts those works
of the flesh which are without the Spirit, which bring death [upon
their doers], he exclaimed at the end of his Epistle, in accordance
with what he had already declared, "And as we have borne
the image of him who is of the earth, we shall also bear the image
of Him who is from heaven. For this I say, brethren, that flesh
and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God."(5) Now this
which he says, "as we have borne the image of him who is
of the earth," is analogous to what has been declared, "And
such indeed ye were; but ye have been washed, but ye have been
sanctified, but ye have been justified in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God." When, therefore,
did we bear the image of him who is of the earth? Doubtless it
was when those actions spoken of as "works of the flesh"
used to be wrought in us. And then, again, when [do we bear] the
image of the heavenly? Doubtless when he says, "Ye have been
washed," believing in the name of the Lord, and receiving
His Spirit. Now we have washed away, not the substance of our
body, nor the image of our [primary] formation, but the former
vain conversation. In these members, therefore, in which we were
going to destruction by working the works of corruption, in these
very members are we made alive by working the works of the Spirit.
CHAP. XII.--OF THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LIFE AND DEATH; OF THE BREATH
OF LIFE AND THE VIVIFYING SPIRIT: ALSO HOW IT IS THAT THE SUBSTANCE
OF FLESH REVIVES WHICH ONCE WAS DEAD.
1. For as the flesh is capable of corruption, so is it also
of incorruption; and as it is of death, so is it also of life.
These two do mutually give way to each other; and both cannot
remain in the same place, but one is driven out by the other,
and the presence of the one destroys that of the other. If, then,
when death takes possession of a man, it drives life away from
him, and proves him to be dead, much more does life, when it has
obtained power over the man, drive out death, and restore him
as living unto God. For if death brings mortality, why should
not life, when it comes, vivify man? Just as Esaias the prophet
says, "Death devoured when it had prevailed."(6) And
again, "God has wiped away every tear from every face."
Thus that former life is expelled, because it was not given by
the Spirit, but by the breath.
2. For the breath of life, which also rendered man an animated
being, is one thing, and the vivifying Spirit another, which also
caused him to become spiritual. And for this reason Isaiah said,
"Thus saith the LORD, who made heaven and established it,
who founded the earth and the things therein, and gave breath
to the people
538
upon it, and Spirit to those walking upon it;"(1) thus telling
us that breath is indeed given in common to all people upon earth,
but that the Spirit is theirs alone who tread down earthly desires.
And therefore Isaiah himself, distinguishing the things already
mentioned, again exclaims, "For the Spirit shall go forth
from Me, and I have made every breath."(2) Thus does he attribute
the Spirit as peculiar to God which in the last times He pours
forth upon the human race by the adoption of sons; but [he shows]
that breath was common throughout the creation, and points it
out as something created. Now what has been made is a different
thing from him who makes it. The breath, then, is temporal, but
the Spirit eternal. The breath, too, increases [in strength] for
a short period, and continues for a certain time; after that it
takes its departure, leaving its former abode destitute of breath.
But when the Spirit pervades the man within and without, inasmuch
as it continues there, it never leaves him. "But that is
not first which is spiritual," says the apostle, speaking
this as if with reference to us human beings; "but that is
first which is animal, afterwards that which is spiritual,"(3)
in accordance with reason. For there had been a necessity that,
in the first place, a human being should be fashioned, and that
what was fashioned should receive the soul; afterwards that it
should thus receive the communion of the Spirit. Wherefore also
"the first Adam was made" by the Lord "a living
soul, the second Adam a quickening spirit."(4) As, then,
he who was made a living soul forfeited life when he turned aside
to what was evil, so, on the other hand, the same individual,
when he reverts to what is good, and receives the quickening Spirit,
shall find life.
3. For it is not one thing which dies and another which is
quickened, as neither is it one thing Which is lost and another
which is found, but the Lord came seeking for that same sheep
which had been lost. What was it, then, which was dead? Undoubtedly
it was the substance of the flesh; the same, too, which had lost
the breath of life, and had become breathless and dead. This same,
therefore, was what the Lord came to quicken, that as in Adam
we do all die, as being of an animal nature, in Christ we may
all live, as being spiritual, not laying aside God's handiwork,
but the lusts of the flesh, and receiving the Holy Spirit; as
the apostle says in the Epistle to the Colossians: "Mortify,
therefore, your members which are upon the earth." And what
these are he himself explains: "Fornication, uncleanness,
inordinate affection, evil concupiscence; and covetousness, which
is idolatry."(5) The laying aside of these is what the apostle
preaches; and he declares that those who do such things, as being
merely flesh and blood, cannot inherit the kingdom of heaven.
For their soul, tending towards what is worse, and descending
to earthly lusts, has become a partaker in the same designation
which belongs to these [lusts, viz., "earthly"], which,
when the apostle commands us to lay aside, he says in the same
Epistle, "Cast ye off the old man with his deeds."(6)
But when he said this, he does not remove away the ancient formation
[of man]; for in that case it would be incumbent on us to rid
ourselves of its company by committing suicide.
4. But the apostle himself also, being one who had been formed
in a womb, and had issued thence, wrote to us, and confessed in
his Epistle to the Philippians that "to live in the flesh
was the fruit of [his] work;"(7) thus expressing himself.
Now the final result of the work of the Spirit is the salvation
of the flesh.(8) For what other visible fruit is there of the
invisible Spirit, than the rendering of the flesh mature and capable
of incorruption? If then [he says], "To live in the flesh,
this is the result of labour to me," he did not surely contemn
the substance of flesh in that passage where he said, "Put
ye off the old man with his works;"(9) but he points out
that we should lay aside our former conversation, that which waxes
old and becomes corrupt; and for this reason he goes on to say,
"And put ye on the new man, that which is renewed in knowledge,
after the image of Him who created him." In this, therefore,
that he says, "which is renewed in knowledge," he demonstrates
that he, the selfsame man who was in ignorance in times past,
that is, in ignorance of God, is renewed by that knowledge which
has respect to Him. For the knowledge of God renews man. And when
he says, "after the image of the Creator," he sets forth
the recapitulation of the same man, who was at the beginning made
after the likeness of God.
5. And that he, the apostle, was the very same person who
had been born from the womb, that is, of the ancient substance
of flesh, he does himself declare in the Epistle to the Galatians:
"But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's
womb, and called me by His grace, to reveal His Son in me, that
I might preach Him among the Gentiles," (10) it was not,
as I have already observed, one person who had
539
been born from the womb, and another who preached the Gospel of
the Son of God; but that same individual who formerly was ignorant,
and used to persecute the Church, when the revelation was made
to him from heaven, and the Lord conferred with him, as I have
pointed out in the third book,(1) preached the Gospel of Jesus
Christ the Son of God, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate,
his former ignorance being driven out by his subsequent knowledge:
just as the blind men whom the Lord healed did certainly lose
their blindness, but received the substance of their eyes perfect,
and obtained the power of vision in the very same eyes with which
they formerly did not see; the darkness being merely driven away
by the power of vision, while the substance of the eyes was retained,
in order that, by means of those eyes through which they had not
seen, exercising again the visual power, they might give thanks
to Him who had restored them again to sight. And thus, also, he
whose withered hand was healed, and all who were healed generally,
did not change those parts of their bodies which had at their
birth come forth from the womb, but simply obtained these anew
in a healthy condition.
6. For the Maker of all things, the Word of God, who did also
from the beginning form man, when He found His handiwork impaired
by wickedness, performed upon it all kinds of healing. At one
time [He did so], as regards each separate member, as it is found
in His own handiwork; and at another time He did once for all
restore man sound and whole in all points, preparing him perfect
for Himself unto the resurrection. For what was His object in
healing [different] portions of the flesh, and restoring them
to their original condition, if those parts which had been healed
by Him were not in a position to obtain salvation? For if it was
[merely] a temporary benefit which He conferred, He granted nothing
of importance to those who were the subjects of His healing. Or
how can they maintain that the flesh is incapable of receiving
the life which flows from Him, when it received healing from Him?
For life is brought about through healing, and incorruption through
life. He, therefore, who confers healing, the same does also confer
life; and He [who gives] life, also surrounds His own handiwork
with incorruption.
CHAP. XIII.--IN THE DEAD WHO WERE RAISED BY CHRIST WE POSSESS
THE HIGHEST PROOF OF THE RESURRECTION; AND OUR HEARTS ARE SHOWN
TO BE CAPABLE OF LIFE ETERNAL, BECAUSE THEY CAN NOW RECEIVE THE
SPIRIT OF GOD.
1. Let our opponents--that is, they who speak against their
own salvation--inform us [as to this point]: The deceased daughter
of the high priest;(2) the widow's dead son, who was being carded
out [to burial] near the gate [of the city];(3) and Lazarus, who
had lain four days in the tomb,(4)--in what bodies did they rise
again? In those same, no doubt, in which they had also died. For
if it were not in the very same, then certainly those same individuals
who had died did not rise again. For [the Scripture] says, "The
Lord took the hand of the dead man, and said to him, Young man,
I say unto thee, Arise. And the dead man sat up, and He commanded
that something should be given him to eat; and He delivered him
to his mother."(5) Again, He called Lazarus "with a
loud voice, saying, Lazarus, come forth; and he that was dead
came forth bound with bandages, feet and hands." This was
symbolical of that man who had been bound in sins. And therefore
the Lord said, "Loose him, and let him depart." As,
therefore, those who were healed were made whole in those members
which had in times past been afflicted; and the dead rose in the
identical bodies, their limbs and bodies receiving health, and
that life which was granted by the Lord, who prefigures eternal
things by temporal, and shows that it is He who is Himself able
to extend both healing and life to His handiwork, that His words
concerning its [future] resurrection may also be believed; so
also at the end, when the Lord utters His voice "by the last
trumpet,"(6) the dead shall be raised, as He Himself declares:
"The hour shall come, in which all the dead which are in
the tombs shall hear the voice of the Son of man, and shall come
forth; those that have done good to the resurrection of life,
and those that have done evil to the resurrection of judgment."(7)
2. Vain, therefore, and truly miserable, are those who do
not choose to see what is so manifest and clear, but shun the
light of truth, blinding themselves like the tragic OEdipus. And
as those who are not practised in wrestling, when they contend
with others, laying hold with a determined grasp of some part
of [their opponent's] body, really fall by means of that which
they grasp, yet when they fall, imagine that they are gaining
the victory, because they have obstinately kept their hold upon
that part which they seized at the outset, and besides falling,
become
540
subjects of ridicule; so is it with respect to that [favourite]
expression of the heretics: "Flesh and blood cannot inherit
the kingdom of God;" while taking two expressions of Paul's,
without having perceived the apostle's meaning, or examined critically
the force of the terms, but keeping fast hold of the mere expressions
by themselves, they die in consequence of their influence (<greek>periautas</greek>),
overturning as far as in them lies the entire dispensation of
God.
3. For thus they will allege that this passage refers to the
flesh strictly so called, and not to fleshly works, as I have
pointed out, so representing the apostle as contradicting himself.
For immediately following, in the same Epistle, he says conclusively,
speaking thus in reference to the flesh: "For this corruptible
must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.
So, when this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall
be brought to pass the saying which is written, Death is swallowed
up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O death, where is
thy victory?"(1) Now these words shall be appropriately said
at the time when this mortal and corruptible flesh, which is subject
to death, which also is pressed down by a certain dominion of
death, rising up into life, shall put on incorruption and immortality.
For then, indeed, shall death be truly vanquished, when that flesh
which is held down by it shall go forth from under its dominion.
And again, to the Philippians he says: "But our conversation
is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord
Jesus, who shall transfigure the body of our humiliation conformable
to the body of His glory, even as He is able (ita ut possit) according
to the working of His own power."(2) What, then, is this
"body of humiliation" which the Lord shall transfigure,
[so as to be] conformed to "the body of His glory?"
Plainly it is this body composed of flesh, which is indeed humbled
when it falls into the earth. Now its transformation [takes place
thus], that while it is mortal and corruptible, it becomes immortal
and incorruptible, not after its own proper substance, but after
the mighty working of the Lord, who is able to invest the mortal
with immortality, and the corruptible with incorruption. And therefore
he says,(3) "that mortality may be swallowed up of life.
He who has perfected us for this very thing is God, who also
has given unto us the earnest of the Spirit."(4) He uses
these words most manifestly in reference to the flesh; for the
soul is not mortal, neither is the spirit. Now, what is mortal
shall be swallowed up of life, when the flesh is dead no longer,
but remains living and incorruptible, hymning the praises of God,
who has perfected us for this very thing. In order, therefore,
that we may be perfected for this, aptly does he say to the Corinthians,
"Glorify God in your body."(5) Now God is He who gives
rise to immortality.
4. That he uses these words with respect to the body of flesh,
and to none other, he declares to the Corinthians manifestly,
indubitably, and free from all ambiguity: "Always bearing
about in our body the dying of Jesus,(6) that also the life of
Jesus Christ might be manifested in our body. For if we who live
are delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, it is that the life
of Jesus may also be manifested in our mortal flesh."(7)
And that the Spirit lays hold on the flesh, he says in the same
Epistle, "That ye axe the epistle of Christ, ministered by
us, inscribed not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living
God, not in tables of stone, but in the fleshly tables of the
heart."(8) If, therefore, in the present time, fleshly hearts
are made partakers of the Spirit, what is there astonishing if,
in the resurrection, they receive that life which is granted by
the Spirit? Of which resurrection the apostle speaks in the Epistle
to the Philippians: "Having been made conformable to His
death, if by any means I might attain to the resurrection which
is from the dead."(9) In what other mortal flesh, therefore,
can life be understood as being manifested, unless in that substance
which is also put to death on account of that confession which
is made of God?--as he has himself declared, "If, as a man,
I have fought with beasts(10) at Ephesus, what advantageth it
me if the dead rise not? For if the dead rise not, neither has
Christ risen. Now, if Christ has not risen, our preaching is vain,
and your faith is vain. In that case, too, we are found false
witnesses for God, since we have testified that He raised up Christ,
whom [upon that supposition] He did not raise up.(11) For if the
dead rise not, neither has Christ risen. But if Christ be not
risen, your faith is vain, since ye are yet in your sins. Therefore
those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in this
life only we have hope in Christ, we are more miserable than all
men. But now Christ has
541
risen from the dead, the first-fruits of those that sleep; for
as by man [came] death, by man also [came] the resurrection of
the dead."(1)
5. In all these passages, therefore, as I have already said,
these men must either allege that the apostle expresses opinions
contradicting himself, with respect to that statement, "Flesh
and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God;" or, on the
other hand, they will be forced to make perverse and crooked interpretations
of all the passages, so as to overturn and alter the sense of
the words. For what sensible thing can they say, if they endeavour
to interpret otherwise this which he writes: "For this corruptible
must put on incorruption, and this mortal put on immortality;"(2)
and, "That the life of Jesus may be made manifest in our
mortal flesh;"(3) and all the other passages in which the
apostle does manifestly and clearly declare the resurrection and
incorruption of the flesh? And thus shall they be compelled to
put a false interpretation upon passages such as these, they who
do not choose to understand one correctly.
CHAP. XIV.--UNLESS THE FLESH WERE TO BE SAVED, THE WORD WOULD
NOT HAVE TAKEN UPON HIM FLESH OF THE SAME SUBSTANCE AS OURS: FROM
THIS IT WOULD FOLLOW THAT NEITHER SHOULD WE HAVE BEEN RECONCILED
BY HIM.
1. And inasmuch as the apostle has not pronounced against
the very substance of flesh and blood, that it cannot inherit
the kingdom of God, the same apostle has everywhere adopted the
term "flesh and blood" with regard to the Lord Jesus
Christ, partly indeed to establish His human nature (for He did
Himself speak of Himself as the Son of man), and partly that He
might confirm the salvation of our flesh. For if the flesh were
not in a position to be saved, the Word of God would in no wise
have become flesh. And if the blood of the righteous were not
to be inquired after, the Lord would certainly not have had blood
[in His composition]. But inasmuch as blood cries out (vocalis
est) from the beginning [of the world], God said to Cain, when
he had slain his brother, "The voice of thy brother's blood
crieth to Me."(4) And as their blood will be inquired after,
He said to those with Noah, "For your blood of your souls
will I require, [even] from the hand of all beasts;"(5) and
again, "Whosoever will shed man's blood,(6) it shall be shed
for his blood." In like manner, too, did the Lord say to
those who should afterwards shed His blood, "All righteous
blood shall be required which is shed upon the earth, from the
blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zacharias the son of Barachias,
whom ye slew between the temple and the altar. Verily I say unto
you, All these things shall come upon this generation."(7)
He thus points out the recapitulation that should take place in
his own person of the effusion of blood from the beginning, of
all the righteous men and of the prophets, and that by means of
Himself there should be a requisition of their blood. Now this
[blood] could not be required unless it also had the capability
of being saved; nor would the Lord have summed up these things
in Himself, unless He had Himself been made flesh and blood after
the way of the original formation [of man], saving in his own
person at the end that which had in the beginning perished in
Adam.
2. But if the Lord became incarnate for any other order of
things, and took flesh of any other substance, He has not then
summed up human nature in His own person, nor in that case can
He be termed flesh. For flesh has been truly made [to consist
in] a transmission of that thing moulded originally from the dust.
But if it had been necessary for Him to draw the material [of
His body] from another substance, the Father would at the beginning
have moulded the material [of flesh] from a different substance
[than from what He actually did]. But now the case stands thus,
that the Word has saved that which really was [created, viz.,]
humanity which had perished, effecting by means of Himself that
communion which should be held with it, and seeking out its salvation.
But the thing which had perished possessed flesh and blood. For
the Lord, taking dust from the earth, moulded man; and it was
upon his behalf that all the dispensation of the Lord's advent
took place. He had Himself, therefore, flesh and blood, recapitulating
in Himself not a certain other, but that original handiwork of
the Father, seeking out that thing which had perished. And for
this cause the apostle, in the Epistle to the Colossians, says,
"And though ye were formerly alienated, and enemies to His
knowledge by evil works, yet now ye have been reconciled in the
body of His flesh, through His death, to present yourselves holy
and chaste, and without fault in His sight."(8) He says,
"Ye have been reconciled in the body of His flesh,"
because the righteous flesh has reconciled that flesh which was
being kept under bondage in sin, and brought it into friendship
with God.
3. If, then, any one allege that in this respect the flesh
of the Lord was different from ours, because it indeed did not
commit sin, neither
542
was deceit found in His soul, while we, on the other hand, are
sinners, he says what is the fact. But if he pretends that the,
Lord possessed another substance of flesh, the sayings respecting
reconciliation will not agree with that man. For that thing is
reconciled which had formerly been in enmity. Now, if the Lord
had taken flesh from another substance, He would not, by so doing,
have reconciled that one to God which had become inimical through
transgression. But now, by means of communion with Himself, the
Lord has reconciled man to God the Father, in reconciling us to
Himself by the body of His own flesh, and redeeming us by His
own blood, as the apostle says to the Ephesians, "In whom
we have redemption through His blood, the remission of sins;"(1)
and again to the same he says, "Ye who formerly were far
off have been brought near in the blood of Christ;"(2) and
again, "Abolishing in His flesh the enmities, [even] the
law of commandments [contained] in ordinances."(3) And in
every Epistle the apostle plainly testifies, that through the
flesh of our Lord, and through His blood, we have been saved.
4. If, therefore, flesh and blood are the things which procure
for us life, it has not been declared of flesh and blood, in the
literal meaning (proprie) of the terms, that they cannot inherit
the kingdom of God; but [these words apply] to those carnal deeds
already mentioned, which, perverting man to sin, deprive him of
life. And for this reason he says, in the Epistle to the Romans:
"Let not sin, therefore, reign in your mortal body, to be
under its control: neither yield ye your members instruments of
unrighteousness unto sin; but yield yourselves to God, as being
alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness
unto God."(4) In these same members, therefore, in which
we used to serve sin, and bring forth fruit unto death, does He
wish us to [be obedient] unto righteousness, that we may bring
forth fruit unto life. Remember, therefore, my beloved friend,
that thou hast been redeemed by the flesh of our Lord, re-established(5)
by His blood; and "holding the Head, from which the whole
body of the Church, having been fitted together, takes increase"(6)--that
is, acknowledging the advent in the flesh of the Son of God, and
[His] divinity (deum), and looking forward with constancy to His
human nature(7) (hominem), availing thyself also of these proofs
drawn from Scripture--thou dost easily overthrow, as I have pointed
out, all those notions of the heretics which were concocted afterwards.
CHAP. XV.--PROOFS OF THE RESURRECTION FROM ISAIAH AND EZEKIEL;
THE SAME GOD WHO CREATED US WILL ALSO RAISE US UP.
1. Now, that He who at the beginning created man, did promise
him a second birth after his dissolution into earth, Esaias thus
declares: "The dead shall rise again, and they who are in
the tombs shall arise, and they who are in the earth shall rejoice.
For the dew which is from Thee is health to them."(8) And
again: "I will comfort you, and ye shall be comforted in
Jerusalem: and ye shall see, and your heart shall rejoice, and
your bones shall flourish as the grass; and the hand of the Lord
shall be known to those who worship Him."(9) And Ezekiel
speaks as follows: "And the hand of the LORD came upon me,
and the LORD led me forth in the Spirit, and set me down in the
midst of the plain, and this place was full of bones. And He caused
me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there were many upon
the surface of the plain very dry. And He said unto me, Son of
man, can these bones live ? And I said, Lord, Thou who hast made
them dost know. And He said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones,
and thou shalt say to them, Ye dry bones, hear the word of the
LORD. Thus saith the LORD to these bones, Behold, I will cause
the spirit of life to come upon you, and I will lay sinews upon
you, and bring up flesh again upon you, and I will stretch skin
upon you, and will put my Spirit into you, and ye shall live;
and ye shall know that I am the LORD. And I prophesied as the
Lord had commanded me. And it came to pass, when I was prophesying,
that, behold, an earthquake, and the bones were drawn together,
each one to its own articulation: and I beheld, and, lo, the sinews
and flesh were produced upon them, and the skins rose upon them
round about, but there was no breath in them. And He said unto
me, Prophesy to the breath, son of man, and say to the breath,
These things saith the LORD, Come from the four winds (spiritibus),
and breathe upon these dead, that they may live. So I prophesied
as the Lord had commanded me, and the breath entered into them;
and they did live, and stood upon their feet, an exceeding great
gathering."(10) And again he says, "Thus saith the LORD,
Behold, I will set your graves open, and cause you to come out
of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel; and ye
shall know that I am the LORD,
543
when I shall open your sepulchres, that I may bring my people
again out of the sepulchres: and I will put my Spirit into you,
and ye shall live; and I will place you in your land, and ye shall
know that I am the LORD. I have said, and I will do, saith the
LORD." (1) As we at once perceive that the Creator (Demiurgo)
is in this passage represented as vivifying our dead bodies, and
promising resurrection to them, and resuscitation from their sepulchres
and tombs, conferring upon them immortality also (He says, "For
as the tree of life, so shall their days be"(2)), He is shown
to be the only God who accomplishes these things, and as Himself
the good Father, benevolently conferring life upon those who have
not life from themselves.
2. And for this reason did the Lord most plainly manifest
Himself and the Father to His disciples, lest, forsooth, they
might seek after another God besides Him who formed man, and who
gave him the breath of life; and that men might not rise to such
a pitch of madness as to feign another Father above the Creator.
And thus also He healed by a word all the others who were in a
weakly condition because of sin; to whom also He said, "Behold,
thou art made whole, sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon
thee:"(3) pointing out by this, that, because of the sin
of disobedience, infirmities have come upon men. To that man,
however, who had been blind from his birth, He gave sight, not
by means of a word, but by an outward action; doing this not without
a purpose, or because it so happened, but that He might show forth
the hand of God, that which at the beginning had moulded man.
And therefore, when His disciples asked Him for what cause the
man had been born blind, whether for his own or his parents' fault,
He replied, "Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents,
but that the works of God should be made manifest in him."(4)
Now the work of God is the fashioning of man. For, as the Scripture
says, He made [man] by a kind of process: "And the Lord took
day from the earth, and formed man."(5) Wherefore also the
Lord spat on the ground and made clay, and smeared it upon the
eyes, pointing out the original fashioning [of man], how it was
effected, and manifesting the hand of God to those who can understand
by what [hand] man was formed out of the dust. For that which
the artificer, the Word, had omitted to form in the womb, [viz.,
the blind man's eyes], He then supplied in public, that the works
of God might be manifested in him, in order that we might not
be seeking out another hand by which man was fashioned, nor another
Father; knowing that this hand of God which formed us at the beginning,
and which does form us in the womb, has in the last times sought
us out who were lost, winning back His own, and taking up the
lost sheep upon His shoulders, and with joy restoring it to the
fold of life.
3. Now, that the Word of God forms us in the womb, He says
to Jeremiah, "Before I formed thee in the womb, I knew thee;
and before thou wentest forth from the belly, I sanctified thee,
and appointed thee a prophet among the nations." (6) And
Paul, too, says in like manner, "But when it pleased God,
who separated me from my mother's womb, that I might declare Him
among the nations."(7) As, therefore, we are by the Word
formed in the womb, this very same Word formed the visual power
in him who had been blind from his birth; showing openly who it
is that fashions us in secret, since the Word Himself had been
made manifest to men: and declaring the original formation of
Adam, and the manner in which he was created, and by what hand
he was fashioned, indicating the whole from a part. For the Lord
who formed the visual powers is He who made the whole man, carrying
out the will of the Father. And inasmuch as man, with respect
to that formation which, was after Adam, having fallen into transgression,
needed the layer of regeneration, [the Lord] said to him [upon
whom He had conferred sight], after He had smeared his eyes with
the clay, "Go to Siloam, and wash;"(8) thus restoring
to him both [his perfect] confirmation, and that regeneration
which takes place by means of the layer. And for this reason when
he was washed he came seeing, that he might both know Him who
had fashioned him, and that man might learn [to know] Him who
has conferred upon him life.
4. All the followers of Valentinus, therefore, lose their
case, when they say that man was not fashioned out of this earth,
but from a fluid and diffused substance. For, from the earth out
of which the Lord formed eyes for that man, from the same earth
it is evident that man was also fashioned at the beginning. For
it were incompatible that the eyes should indeed be formed from
one source and the rest of the body from another; as neither would
it be compatible that one [being] fashioned the body, and another
the eyes. But He, the very same who formed Adam at the beginning,
with whom also the Father spake, [saying], "Let Us make man
after Our image and likeness,"(9) revealing Himself in these
last times to men, formed visual organs (visionem) for him who
had been blind [in
544
that body which he had derived] from Adam. Wherefore also the
Scripture, pointing out what should come to pass, says, that when
Adam had hid himself because of his disobedience, the Lord came
to him at eventide, called him forth, and said, "Where art
thou?"(1) That means that in the last times the very same
Word of God came to call man, reminding him of his doings, living
in which he had been hidden from the Lord. For just as at that
time God spake to Adam at eventide, searching him out; so in the
last times, by means of the same voice, searching out his posterity,
He has visited them.
CHAP. XVI.--SINCE OUR BODIES RETURN TO THE EARTH, IT FOLLOWS THAT
THEY HAVE THEIR SUBSTANCE FROM IT; ALSO, BY THE ADVENT OF THE
WORD, THE IMAGE OF GOD IN US APPEARED IN A CLEARER LIGHT.
1. And since Adam was moulded from this earth to which we
belong, the Scripture tells us that God said to him, "In
the sweat of thy face shall thou eat thy bread, until thou turnest
again to the dust from whence thou weft taken."(2) If then,
after death, our bodies return to any other substance, it follows
that from it also they have their substance. But if it be into
this very [earth], it is manifest that it was also from it that
man's frame was created; as also the Lord clearly showed, when
from this very substance He formed eyes for the man [to whom He
gave sight]. And thus was the hand of God plainly shown forth,
by which Adam was fashioned, and we too have been formed; and
since there is one and the same Father, whose voice from the beginning
even to the end is present with His handiwork, and the substance
from which we were formed is plainly declared through the Gospel,
we should therefore not seek after another Father besides Him,
nor [look for] another substance from which we have been formed,
besides what was mentioned beforehand, and shown forth by the
Lord; nor another hand of God besides that which, from the beginning
even to the end, forms us and prepares us for life, and is present
with His handiwork, and perfects it after the image and likeness
of God.
2. And then, again, this Word was manifested when the Word
of God was made man, assimilating Himself to man, and man to Himself,
so that by means of his resemblance to the Son, man might become
precious to the Father. For in times long past, it was said that
man was created after the image of God, but it was not [actually]
shown; for the Word was as yet invisible, after whose image man
was created, Wherefore also he did easily lose the similitude.
When, however, the Word of God became flesh, He confirmed both
these: for He both showed forth the image truly, since He became
Himself what was His image; and He re-established the similitude
after a sure manner, by assimilating man to the invisible Father
through means of the visible Word.
3. And not by the aforesaid things alone has the Lord manifested
Himself, but [He has done this] also by means of His passion.
For doing away with [the effects of] that disobedience of man
which had taken place at the beginning by the occasion of a tree,
"He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross;"(3)
rectifying that disobedience which had occurred by reason of a
tree, through that obedience which was [wrought out] upon the
tree [of the cross]. Now He would not have come to do away, by
means of that same [image], the disobedience which had been incurred
towards our Maker if He proclaimed another Father. But inasmuch
as it was by these things that we disobeyed God, and did not give
credit to His word, so was it also by these same that He brought
in obedience and consent as respects His Word; by which things
He clearly shows forth God Himself, whom indeed we had offended
in the first Adam, when he did not perform His commandment. In
the second Adam, however, we are reconciled, being made obedient
even unto death. For we were debtors to none other but to Him
whose commandment we had transgressed at the beginning.
CHAP. XVII.--THERE IS BUT ONE LORD AND ONE GOD, THE FATHER AND
CREATOR OF ALL THINGS, WHO HAS LOVED US IN CHRIST, GIVEN US COMMANDMENTS,
AND REMITTED OUR SINS; WHOSE SON AND WORD CHRIST PROVED HIMSELF
TO BE, WHEN HE FORGAVE OUR SINS.
1. Now this being is the Creator (Demiurgus), who is, in respect
of His love, the Father; but in respect of His power, He is Lord;
and in respect of His wisdom, our Maker and Fashioner; by transgressing
whose commandment we became His enemies. And therefore in the
last times the Lord has restored us into friendship through His
incarnation, having become "the Mediator between God and
men;"(4) propitiating indeed for us the Father against whom
we had sinned, and cancelling (consolatus) our disobedience by
His own obedience; conferring also upon us the gift of communion
with, and subjection to, our Maker. For this reason also He has
taught us to say in prayer, "And forgive us our debts;"(5)
since indeed He is our Father, whose debtors we were, having transgressed
His commandments. But who is this Being? Is He some unknown one,
and a Father who gives no com-
545
mandment to any one? Or is He the God who is proclaimed in the
Scriptures, to whom we were debtors, having transgressed His commandment?
Now the commandment was given to man by the Word. For Adam, it
is said, "heard the voice of the LORD God."(1) Rightly
then does His Word say to man, "Thy sins are forgiven thee;"(2)
He, the same against whom we had sinned in the beginning, grants
forgiveness of sins in the end. But if indeed we had disobeyed
the command of any other, while it was a different being who said,
"Thy sins are forgiven thee;"(2) such an one is neither
good, nor true, nor just. For how can he be good, who does not
give from what belongs to himself? Or how can he be just, who
snatches away the goods of another? And in what way can sins be
truly remitted, unless that He against whom we have sinned has
Himself granted remission "through the bowels of mercy of
our God," in which "He has visited us"(3) through
His Son?
2. And therefore, when He had healed the man sick of the palsy,
[the evangelist] says "The people upon seeing it glorified
God, who gave such power unto men."(4) What God, then, did
the bystanders glorify? Was it indeed that unknown Father invented
by the heretics? And how could they glorify him who was altogether
unknown to them? It is evident, therefore, that the Israelites
glorified Him who has been proclaimed as God by the law and the
prophets, who is also the Father of our Lord; and therefore He
taught men, by the evidence of their senses through those signs
which He accomplished, to give glory to God. If, however, He HimSelf
had come from another Father, and men glorified a different Father
when they beheld His miracles, He [in that case] rendered the
mungrateful to that Father who had sent the gift of healing. But
as the only-begotten Son had come for man's salvation from Him
who is God, He did both stir up the incredulous by the miracles
which He was in the habit of working, to give glory to the Father;
and to the Pharisees, who did not admit the advent of His Son,
and who consequently did not believe in the remission [of sins]
which was conferred by Him, He said, "That ye may know that
the Son of man hath power to forgive sins."(5) And when He
had said this, He commanded the paralytic man to take up the pallet
upon which he was lying, and go into his house. By this work of
His He confounded the unbelievers, and showed that He is Himself
the voice of God, by which man received commandments, which he
broke, and became a sinner; for the paralysis followed as a consequence
of sins.
3. Therefore, by remitting sins, He did indeed heal man, while
He also manifested Himself who He was. For if no one can forgive
sins but God alone, while the Lord remitted them and healed men,
it is plain that He was Himself the Word of God made the Son of
man, receiving from the Father the power of remission of sins;
since He was man, and since He was God, in order that since as
man He suffered for us, so as God He might have compassion on
us, and forgive us our debts, in which we were made debtors to
God our Creator. And therefore David said beforehand, "Blessed
are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the man to whom the LORD has not imputed sin;"(6)
pointing out thus that remission of sins which follows upon His
advent, by which "He has destroyed the handwriting"
of our debt, and "fastened it to the cross;"(7) so that
as by means of a tree we were made debtors to God, [so also] by
means of a tree we may obtain the remission of our debt.
3. This fact has been strikingly set forth by many others,
and especially through means of Elisha the prophet. For when his
fellow-prophets were hewing wood for the construction of a tabernacle,
and when the iron [head], shaken loose from the axe, had fallen
into the Jordan and could not be found by them, upon Elisha's
coming to the place, and learning what had happened, he threw
some wood into the water. Then, when he had done this, the iron
part of the axe floated up, and they took up from the surface
of the water what they had previously lost.(8) By this action
the prophet pointed out that the sure word of God, which we had
negligently lost by means of a tree, and were not in the way of
finding again, we should receive anew by the dispensation of a
tree, [viz., the cross of Christ]. For that the word of God is
likened to an axe, John the Baptist declares [when he says] in
reference to it, "But now also is the axe laid to the root
of the trees."(9) Jeremiah also says to the same purport:
"The word of God cleaveth the rock as an axe."(10) This
word, then, what was hidden from us, did the dispensation of the
tree make manifest, as I have already remarked. For as we lost
it by means of a tree, by means of a tree again was it made manifest
to all, showing the height, the length, the breadth, the depth
in itself; and, as a certain man among our predecessors observed,
"Through the extension of the hands of a divine person,(11)
gathering together the two peoples to one God."
546
For these were two hands, because there were two peoples scattered
to the ends of the earth; but there was one head in the middle,
as there is but one God, who is above all, and through all, and
in us all.
CHAP. XVIII.--GOD THE FATHER AND HIS WORD HAVE FORMED ALL CREATED
THINGS (WHICH THEY USE) BY THEIR OWN POWER AND WISDOM, NOT OUT
OF DEFECT OR IGNORANCE. THE SON OF GOD, WHO RECEIVED ALL POWER
FROM THE FATHER, WOULD OTHERWISE NEVER HAVE TAKEN FLESH UPON HIM.
1. And such or so important a dispensation He did not bring
about by means of the creations of others, but by His own; neither
by those things which were created out of ignorance and defect,
but by those which had their substance from the wisdom and power
of His Father. For He was neither unrighteous, so that He should
covet the property of another; nor needy, that He could not by
His own means impart life to His own, and make use of His own
creation for the salvation of man. For indeed the creation could
not have sustained Him [on the cross], if He had sent forth [simply
by commission] what was the fruit of ignorance and defect. Now
we have repeatedly shown that the incarnate Word of God was suspended
upon a tree, and even the very heretics do acknowledge that He
was crucified. How, then, could the fruit of ignorance and defect
sustain Him who contains the knowledge of all things, and is true
and perfect? Or how could that creation which was concealed from
the Father, and far removed from Him, have sustained His Word?
And if this world were made by the angels (it matters not whether
we suppose their ignorance or their cognizance of the Supreme
God), when the Lord declared, "For I am in the Father, and
the Father in Me,"(1) how could this workmanship of the angels
have borne to be burdened at once with the Father and the Son?
How, again, could that creation which is beyond the Pleroma have
contained Him who contains the entire Pleroma? Inasmuch, then,
as all these things are impossible and incapable of proof, that
preaching of the Church is alone true [which proclaims] that His
own creation bare Him, which subsists by the power, the skill,
and the wisdom of God; which is sustained, indeed, after an invisible
manner by the Father, but, on the contrary, after a visible manner
it bore His Word: and this is the true [Word].
2. For the Father bears the creation and His own Word simultaneously,
and the Word borne by the Father grants the Spirit to all as the
Father wills.(2) To some He gives after the manner of creation
what is made;(3) but to others [He gives] after the manner of
adoption, that is, what is from God, namely generation. And thus
one God the Father is declared, who is above all, and through
all, and in all. The Father is indeed above all, and He is the
Head of Christ; but the Word is through all things, and is Himself
the Head of the Church; while the Spirit is in us all, and He
is the living water,(4) which the Lord grants to those who rightly
believe in Him, and love Him, and who know that "there is
one Father, who is above all, and through all, and in us all."(5)
And to these things does John also, the disciple of the Lord,
bear witness, when he speaks thus in the Gospel: "In the
beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word
was God. This was in the beginning with God. All things were made
by Him, and without Him was nothing made."(6) And then he
said of the Word Himself: "He was in the world, and the world
was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. To His own things
He came, and His own people received Him not. However, as many
as did receive Him, to these gave He power to become the sons
of God, to those that believe in His name."(7) And again,
showing the dispensation with regard to His human nature, John
said: "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us."(8)
And in continuation he says, "And we beheld His glory, the
glory as of the Only-begotten by the Father, full of grace and
truth." He thus plainly points out to those willing to hear,
that is, to those having ears, that there is one God, the Father
over all, and one Word of God, who is through all, by whom all
things have been made; and that this world belongs to Him, and
was made by Him, according to the Father's will, and not by angels;
nor by apostasy, defect, and ignorance; nor by any power of Prunicus,
whom certain of them also call "the Mother;" nor by
any other maker of the world ignorant of the Father.
3. For the Creator of the world is truly the Word of God:
and this is our Lord, who in the last times was made man, existing
in this world, and who in an invisible manner contains all things
created, and is inherent in the entire creation, since the Word
of God governs and arranges all
547
things; and therefore He came to His own in a visible(1) manner,
and was made flesh, and hung upon the tree, that He might sum
up all things in Himself. "And His own peculiar people did
not receive Him," as Moses declared this very thing among
the people: "And thy life shall be hanging before thine eyes,
and thou wilt not believe thy life."(2) Those therefore who
did not receive Him did not receive life. "But to as many
as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God."(3)
For it is He who has power from the Father over all things, since
He is the Word of God, and very man, communicating with invisible
beings after the manner of the intellect, and appointing a law
observable to the outward senses, that all things should continue
each in its own order; and He reigns manifestly over things visible
and pertaining to men; and brings in just judgment and worthy
upon all; as David also, clearly pointing to this, says, "Our
God shall openly come, and will not keep silence."(4) Then
he shows also the judgment which is brought in by Him, saying,
"A fire shall burn in His sight, and a strong tempest shall
rage round about Him. He shall call upon the heaven from above,
and the earth, to judge His people."
CHAP. XIX.--A COMPARISON IS INSTITUTED BETWEEN THE DISOBEDIENT
AND SINNING EVE AND THE VIRGIN MARY, HER PATRONESS. VARIOUS AND
DISCORDANT HERESIES ARE MENTIONED.
1. That the Lord then was manifestly coming to His own things,
and was sustaining them by means of that creation which is supported
by Himself, and was making a recapitulation of that disobedience
which had occurred in connection with a tree, through the obedience
which was [exhibited by Himself when He hung] upon a tree, [the
effects] also of that deception being done away with, by which
that virgin Eve, who was already espoused to a man, was unhappily
misled,--was happily announced, through means of the truth [spoken]
by the angel to the Virgin Mary, who was [also espoused] to a
man.(5) For just as the former was led astray by the word of an
angel, so that she fled from God when she had transgressed His
word; so did the latter, by an angelic communication, receive
the glad tidings that she should sustain (portaret) God, being
obedient to His word. And if the former did disobey God, yet the
latter was persuaded to be obedient to God, in order that the
Virgin Mary might become the patroness(6) (advocata) of the virgin
Eve. And thus, as the human race fell into bondage to death by
means of a virgin, so is it rescued by a virgin; virginal disobedience
having been balanced in the opposite scale by virginal obedience.
For in the same way the sin of the first created man (protoplasti)
receives amendment by the correction of the First-begotten, and
the coming of the serpent is conquered by the harmlessness of
the dove, those bonds being unloosed by which we had been fast
bound to death.
2. The heretics being all unlearned and ignorant of God's
arrangements, and not acquainted with that dispensation by which
He took upon Him human nature (inscii ejus quoe est secundum hominem
dispensationis), inasmuch as they blind themselves with regard
to the truth, do in fact speak against their own salvation. Some
of them introduce another Father besides the Creator; some, again,
say that the world and its substance was made by certain angels;
certain others [maintain] that it was widely separated by Horos(7)
from him whom they represent as being the Father--that it sprang
forth (floruisse) of itself, and from itself was born. Then, again,
others [of them assert] that it obtained substance in those things
which are contained by the Father, from defect and ignorance;
others still, despise the advent of the Lord manifest [to the
senses], for they do not admit His incarnation; while others,
ignoring the arrangement [that He should be born] of a virgin,
main-rain that He was begotten by Joseph. And still further, some
affirm that neither their soul nor their body can receive eternal
life, but merely the inner man. Moreover, they will have it that
this [inner man] is that which is the understanding (sensum) in
them, and which they decree as being the only thing to ascend
to "the perfect." Others [maintain], as I have said
in the first book, that while the soul is saved, their body does
not participate in the salvation which comes from God; in which
[book] I have also set forward the hypotheses of all these men,
and in the second have pointed out their weakness and inconsistency.
CHAP. XX.--THOSE PASTORS ARE TO BE HEARD TO WHOM THE APOSTLES
COMMITTED THE CHURCHES, POSSESSING ONE AND THE SAME DOCTRINE OF
SALVATION; THE HERETICS, ON THE OTHER HAND, ARE TO BE AVOIDED.
WE MUST THINK SOBERLY WITH REGARD TO THE MYSTERIES OF THE FAITH.
1. Now all these [heretics] are of much later date than the
bishops to whom the apostles committed the Churches; which fact
I have in the third book taken all pains to demonstrate. It follows,
then, as a matter of course, that these
548
heretics aforementioned, since they are blind to the truth, and
deviate from the [right] way, will walk in various roads; and
therefore the footsteps of their doctrine are scattered here and
there without agreement or connection. But the path of those belonging
to the Church circumscribes the whole world, as possessing the
sure tradition from the apostles, and gives unto us to see that
the faith of all is one and the same, since all receive one and
the same God the Father, and believe in the same dispensation
regarding the incarnation of the Son of God, and are cognizant
of the same gift of the Spirit, and are conversant with the same
commandments, and preserve the same form of ecclesiastical constitution,(1)
and expect the same advent of the Lord, and await the same salvation
of the complete man, that is, of the soul and body. And undoubtedly
the preaching of the Church is true and stedfast, in which one
and the same way of salvation is shown throughout the whole world.
For to her is entrusted the light of God; and therefore the "wisdom"
of God, by means of which she saves all men, "is declared
in [its] going forth; it uttereth [its voice] faithfully in the
streets, is preached on the tops of the walls, and speaks continually
in the gates of the city."(3) For the Church preaches the
truth everywhere, and she is the seven-branched candlestick which
bears the light of Christ.
2. Those, therefore, who desert the preaching of the Church,
call in question the knowledge of the holy presbyters, not taking
into consideration of how much greater consequence is a religious
man, even in a private station, than a blasphemous and impudent
sophist.(4) Now, such are all the heretics, and those who imagine
that they have hit upon something more beyond the truth, so that
by following those things already mentioned, proceeding on their
way variously, in harmoniously, and foolishly, not keeping always
to the same opinions with regard to the same things, as blind
men are led by the blind, they shall deservedly fall into the
ditch of ignorance lying in their path, ever seeking and never
finding out the truth.(5) It behoves us, therefore, to avoid their
doctrines, and to take careful heed lest we suffer any injury
from them; but to flee to the Church, and be brought up in her
bosom, and be nourished with the Lord's Scriptures. For the Church
has been planted as a garden (paradisus) in this world; therefore
says the Spirit of God, "Thou mayest freely eat from every
tree of the garden,"(6) that is, Eat ye from every Scripture
of the Lord; but ye shall not eat with an uplifted mind, nor touch
any heretical discord. For these men do profess that they have
themselves the knowledge of good and evil; and they set their
own impious minds above the God who made them. They therefore
form opinions on what is beyond the limits of the understanding.
For this cause also the apostle says, "Be not wise beyond
what it is fitting to be wise, but be wise prudently,"(7)
that we be not east forth by eating of the "knowledge"
of these men (that knowledge which knows more than it should do)
from the paradise of life. Into this paradise the Lord has introduced
those who obey His call, "summing up in Himself all things
which are in heaven, and which are on earth;"(8) but the
things in heaven are spiritual, while those on earth constitute
the dispensation in human nature (secundum hominem est dispositio).
These things, therefore, He recapitulated in Himself: by uniting
man to the Spirit, and causing the Spirit to dwell in man, He
is Himself made the head of the Spirit, and gives the Spirit to
be the head of man: for through Him (the Spirit) we see, and hear,
and speak.
CHAP. XXI.--CHRIST IS THE HEAD OF ALL THINGS ALREADY MENTIONED.
IT WAS FITTING THAT HE SHOULD BE SENT BY THE FATHER, THE CREATOR
OF ALL THINGS, TO ASSUME HUMAN NATURE, AND SHOULD BE TEMPTED BY
SATAN, THAT HE MIGHT FULFIL THE PROMISES, AND CARRY OFF A GLORIOUS
AND PERFECT VICTORY.
1. He has therefore, in His work of recapitulation, summed
up all things, both waging war against our enemy, and crushing
him who had at the beginning led us away captives in Adam, and
trampled upon his head, as thou canst perceive in Genesis that
God said to the serpent, "And I will put enmity between thee
and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; He shall be
on the watch for (observabit(9)) thy head, and thou on the watch
for His heel."(10) For from that time, He who should be born
of a woman, [namely] from the Virgin, after the likeness of Adam,
was preached as keeping watch for the head of the serpent. This
is the seed of which the apostle says in the Epistle to the Galatians,
"that the law of works was established until the seed should
come to whom the promise was made."(11) This fact is exhibited
in a still clearer light in the same Epistle, where he thus speaks:
"But when the fulness of time was come, God
549
sent forth His Son, made of a woman."(1) For indeed the enemy
would not have been fairly vanquished, unless it had been a man
[born] of a woman who conquered him. For it was by means of a
woman that he got the advantage over man at first, setting himself
up as man's opponent. And therefore does the Lord profess Himself
to be the Son of man, comprising in Himself that original man
out of whom the woman was fashioned (ex quo ea quae secundum mulierem
est plasmatio facta est), in order that, as our species went down
to death through a vanquished man, so we may ascend to life again
through a victorious one; and as through a man death received
the palm [of victory] against us, so again by a man we may receive
the palm against death.
2. Now the Lord would not have recapitulated in Himself that
ancient and primary enmity against the serpent, fulfilling the
promise of the Creator (Demiurgi), and performing His command,
if He had come from another Father. But as He is one and the same,
who formed us at the beginning, and sent His Son at the end, the
Lord did perform His command, being made of a woman, by both destroying
our adversary, and perfecting man after the image and likeness
of God. And for this reason He did not draw the means of confounding
him from any other source than from the words of the law, and
made use of the Father's commandment as a help towards the destruction
and confusion of the apostate angel. Fasting forty days, like
Moses and Elias, He afterwards hungered, first, in order that
we may perceive that He was a real and substantial man--for it
belongs to a man to suffer hunger when fasting; and secondly,
that His opponent might have an opportunity of attacking Him.
For as at the beginning it was by means of food that [the enemy]
persuaded man, although not suffering hunger, to transgress God's
commandments, so in the end he did not succeed in persuading Him
that was an hungered to take that food which proceeded from God.
For, when tempting Him, he said, "If thou be the Son of God,
command that these stones be made bread."(2) But the Lord
repulsed him by the commandment of the law, saying, "It is
written, Man doth not live by bread alone."(3) As to those
words '[of His enemy,] "If thou be the Son of God,"
[the Lord] made no remark; but by thus acknowledging His human
nature He baffled His adversary, and exhausted the force of his
first attack by means of His Father's word. The corruption of
man, therefore, which occurred in paradise by both [of our first
parents] eating, was done away with by [the Lord's] want of food
in this world.(4) But he, being thus vanquished by the law, endeavoured
again to make an assault by himself quoting a commandment of the
law. For, bringing Him to the highest pinnacle of the temple,
he said to Him, "If thou art the Son of God, cast thyself
down. For it is written, That God shall give His angels charge
concerning thee, and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest
perchance thou dash thy foot against a stone;"(5) thus concealing
a falsehood under the guise of Scripture, as is done by all the
heretics. For that was indeed written, [namely], "That He
hath given His angels charge concerning Him;" but "east
thyself down from hence" no Scripture said in reference to
Him: this kind of persuasion the devil produced from himself.
The Lord therefore confuted him out of the law, when He said,
"It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the LORD thy God;"(6)
pointing out by the word contained in the law that which is the
duty of man, that he should not tempt God; and in regard to Himself,
since He appeared in human form, [declaring] that He would not
tempt the LORD his God.(7) The pride of reason, therefore, which
was in the serpent, was put to nought by the humility found in
the man [Christ], and now twice was the devil conquered from Scripture,
when he was detected as advising things contrary to God's commandment,
and was shown to be the enemy of God by [the expression of] his
thoughts. He then, having been thus signally defeated, and then,
as it were, concentrating his forces, drawing up in order all
his available power for falsehood, in the third place "showed
Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them,"(8)
saying, as Luke relates, "All these will I give thee,--for
they are delivered to me; and to whom I will, I give them,--if
thou wilt fall down and worship me." The Lord then, exposing
him in his true character, says, "Depart, Satan; for it is
written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt
thou serve."(9) He both revealed him by this name, and showed
[at the same time] who He Himself was. For the Hebrew word "Satan"
signifies an apostate. And thus, vanquishing him for the third
time, He spurned him from Him finally as being conquered out of
the law; and there was done away with that infringement of God's
commandment which had occurred in Adam, by means of the precept
of the law, which the Son of man ob-
550
served, who did not transgress the commandment of God.
3. Who, then, is this Lord God to whom Christ bears witness,
whom no man shall tempt, whom all should worship, and serve Him
alone? It is, beyond all manner of doubt, that God who also gave
the law. For these things had been predicted in the law, and by
the words (sententiam) of the law the Lord showed that the law
does indeed declare the Word of God from the Father; and the apostate
angel of God is destroyed by its voice, being exposed in his true
colours, and vanquished by the Son of man keeping the commandment
of God. For as in the beginning he enticed man to transgress his
Maker's law, and thereby got him into his power; yet his power
consists in transgression and apostasy, and with these he bound
man [to himself]; so again, on the other hand, it was necessary
that through man himself he should, when conquered, be bound with
the same chains with which he had bound man, in order that man,
being set free, might return to his Lord, leaving to him (Satan)
those bonds by which he himself had been fettered, that is, sin.
For when Satan is bound, man is set free; since "none can
enter a strong man's house and spoil his goods, unless he first
bind the strong man himself."(1) The Lord therefore exposes
him as speaking contrary to the word of that God who made all
things, and subdues him by means of the commandment. Now the law
is the commandment of God. The Man proves him to be a fugitive
from and a transgressor of the law, an apostate also from God.
After [the Man had done this], the Word bound him securely as
a fugitive from Himself, and made spoil of his goods,--namely,
those men whom he held in bondage, and whom he unjustly used for
his own purposes. And justly indeed is he led captive, who had
led men unjustly into bondage; while man, who had been led captive
in times past, was rescued from the grasp of his possessor, according
to the tender mercy of God the Father, who had compassion on His
own handiwork, and gave to it salvation, restoring it by means
of the Word--that is, by Christ--in order that men might learn
by actual proof that he receives incorruptibility not of himself,
but by the free gift of God.
CHAP. XXII.--THE TRUE LORD AND THE ONE GOD IS DECLARED BY THE
LAW, AND MANIFESTED BY CHRIST HIS SON IN THE GOSPEL; WHOM ALONE
WE SHOULD ADORE, AND FROM HIM WE MUST LOOK FOR ALL GOOD THINGS,
NOT FROM SATAN.
1. Thus then does the Lord plainly show that it was the true
Lord and the one God who had been set forth by the law; for Him
whom the law proclaimed as God, the same did Christ point out
as the Father, whom also it behoves the disciples of Christ alone
to serve. By means of the statements of the law, He put our adversary
to utter confusion; and the law directs us to praise God the Creator
(Demiurgum), and to serve Him alone. Since this is the case, we
must not seek for another Father besides Him, or above Him, since
there is one God who justifies the circumcision by faith, and
the uncircumcision through faith.(2) For if there were any other
perfect Father above Him, He (Christ) would by no means have overthrown
Satan by means of His words and commandments. For one ignorance
cannot be done away with by means of another ignorance, any more
than one defect by another defect. If, therefore, the law is due
to ignorance and defect, how could the statements contained therein
bring to nought the ignorance of the devil, and conquer the strong
man? For a strong man can be conquered neither by an inferior
nor by an equal, but by one possessed of greater power. But the
Word of God is the superior above all, He who is loudly proclaimed
in the law: "Hear, O Israel, the LORD thy God is one God;"
and, "Thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thy heart;"
and, "Him shall thou adore, and Him alone shall thou serve."(3)
Then in the Gospel, casting down the apostasy by means of these
expressions, He did both overcome the strong man by His Father's
voice, and He acknowledges the commandment of the law to express
His own sentiments, when He says, "Thou shall not tempt the
LORD thy God."(4) For He did not confound the adversary by
the saying of any other, but by that belonging to His own Father,
and thus overcame the strong man.
2. He taught by His commandment that we who have been set
free should, when hungry, take that food which is given by God;
and that, when placed in the exalted position of every grace [that
can be received], we should not, either by trusting to works of
righteousness, or when adorned with super-eminent [gifts of] ministration,
by any means be lifted up with pride, nor should we tempt God,
but should feel humility in all things, and have ready to hand
[this saying], "Thou shall not tempt the LORD thy God."(5)
As also the apostle taught, saying, "Minding not high things,
but consenting to things of low estate;"(6) that we should
neither be ensnared with riches, nor mundane glory, nor present
fancy, but should know that we must "worship the LORD thy
God, and serve Him alone," and
551
give no heed to him who falsely promised things not his own, when
he said, "All these will I give thee, if, falling down, thou
wilt worship me." For he himself confesses that to adore
him, and to do his will, is to fall from the glory of God. And
in what thing either pleasant or good can that man who has fallen
participate? Or what else can such a person hope for or expect,
except death? For death is next neighbour to him who has fallen.
Hence also it follows that he will not give what he has promised.
For how can he make grants to him who has fallen? Moreover, since
God rules over men and him too, and without the will of our Father
in heaven not even a sparrow falls to the ground,(1) it follows
that his declaration, "All these things are delivered unto
me, and to whomsoever I will I give them," proceeds from
him when puffed up with pride. For the creation is not subjected
to his power, since indeed he is himself but one among created
things. Nor shall he give away the rule over men to men; but both
all other things, and all human affairs, are arranged according
to God the Father's disposal. Besides, the Lord declares that
"the devil is a liar from the beginning, and the truth is
not in him."(2) If then he be a liar and the truth be not
in him, he certainly did not speak truth, but a lie, when he said,
"For all these things are delivered to me, and to whomsoever
I will I give them."(3)
CHAP. XXIII.--THE DEVIL IS WELL PRACTISED IN FALSEHOOD, BY WHICH
ADAM HAVING BEEN LED ASTRAY, SINNED ON THE SIXTH DAY OF THE CREATION,
IN WHICH DAY ALSO HE HAS BEEN RENEWED BY CHRIST.
1. He had indeed been already accustomed to lie against God,
for the purpose of leading men astray. For at the beginning, when
God had given to man a variety of things for food, while He commanded
him not to eat of one tree only, as the Scripture tells us that
God said to Adam: "From every tree which is in the garden
thou shalt eat food; but from the tree of knowledge of good and
evil, from this ye shall not eat: for in the day that ye shall
eat of it, ye shall die by death;"(4) he then, lying against
the Lord, tempted man, as the Scripture says that the serpent
said to the woman: "Has God indeed said this, Ye shall not
eat from every tree of the garden?"(5) And when she had exposed
the falsehood, and simply related the command, as He had said,
"From every tree of the garden we shall eat; but of the fruit
of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said,
Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die:"(6)
when he had [thus] learned from the woman the command of God,
having brought his cunning into play, he finally deceived her
by a falsehood, saying, "Ye shall not die by death; for God
knew that in the day ye shall eat of it your eyes shall be opened,
and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil."(7) In the
first place, then, in the garden of God he disputed about God,
as if God was not there, for he was ignorant of the greatness
of God; and then, in the next place, after he had learned from
the woman that God had said that they should die if they tasted
the aforesaid tree, opening his mouth, he uttered the third falsehood,"
Ye shall not die by death." But that God was true, and the
serpent a liar, was proved by the result, death having passed
upon them who had eaten. For along with the fruit they did also
fall under the power of death, because they did eat in disobedience;
and disobedience to God entails death. Wherefore, as they became
forfeit to death, from that [moment] they were handed over to
it.
2. Thus, then, in the day that they did eat, in the same did
they die, and became death's debtors, since it was one day of
the creation. For it is said, "There was made in the evening,
and there was made in the morning, one day." Now in this
same day that they did eat, in that also did they die. But according
to the cycle and progress of the days, after which one is termed
first, another second, and another third, if anybody seeks diligently
to learn upon what day out of the seven it was that Adam died,
he will find it by examining the dispensation of the Lord. For
by summing up in Himself the whole human race from the beginning
to the end, He has also summed up its death. From this it is clear
that the Lord suffered death, in obedience to His Father, upon
that day on which Adam died while he disobeyed God. Now he died
on the same day in which he did eat. For God said, "In that
day on which ye shall eat of it, ye shall die by death."
The Lord, therefore, recapitulating in Himself this day, underwent
His sufferings upon the day preceding the Sabbath, that is, the
sixth day of the creation, on which day man was created; thus
granting him a second creation by means of His passion, which
is that [creation] out of death. And there are some, again, who
relegate the death of Adam to the thousandth year; for since "a
day of the Lord is as a thousand years,"(8) he did not overstep
the thousand years, but died within them, thus bearing out the
sentence of his sin. Whether, therefore, with respect to disobedience,
which is death; whether
552
[we consider] that, on account of that, they were delivered over
to death, and made debtors to it; whether with respect to [the
fact that on] one and the same day on which they ate they also
died (for it is one day of the creation); whether [we regard this
point], that, with respect to this cycle of days, they died on
the day in which they did also eat, that is, the day] of the preparation,
which is termed "the pure supper," that is, the sixth
day of the feast, which the Lord also exhibited when He suffered
on that day; or whether [we reflect] that he (Adam) did not overstep
the thousand years, but died within their limit,--it follows
that, in regard to all these significations, God is indeed true.
For they died who tasted of the tree; and the serpent is proved
a liar and a murderer, as the Lord said of him: "For he is
a murderer from the beginning, and the truth is not in him."(1)
CHAP. XXIV.--OF THE CONSTANT FALSEHOOD OF THE DEVIL, AND OF THE
POWERS AND GOVERNMENTS OF THE WORLD, WHICH WE OUGHT TO OBEY, INASMUCH
AS THEY ARE APPOINTED OF GOD, NOT OF THE DEVIL.
1. As therefore the devil lied at the beginning, so did he
also in the end, when he said, "All these are delivered unto
me, and to whomsoever I will I give them."(2) For it is not
he who has appointed the kingdoms of this world, but God; for
"the heart of the king is in the hand of God."(3) And
the Word also says by Solomon, "By me kings do reign, and
princes administer justice. By me chiefs are raised up, and by
me kings rule the earth."(4) Paul the apostle also says upon
this same subject: "Be ye subject to all the higher powers;
for there is no power but of God: now those which are have been
ordained of God."(5) And again, in reference to them he says,
"For he beareth not the sword in vain; for he is the minister
of God, the avenger for wrath to him who does evil."(6) Now,
that he spake these words, not in regard to angelical powers,
nor of invisible rulers--as some venture to expound the passage--but
of those of actual human authorities, [he shows when] he says,
"For this cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God's ministers,
doing service for this very thing."(7) This also the Lord
confirmed, when He did not do what He was tempted to by the devil;
but He gave directions that tribute should be paid to the tax-gatherers
for Himself and Peter;(8) because "they are the ministers
of God, serving for this very thing."
2. For since man, by departing from God, reached such a pitch
of fury as even to look upon his brother as his enemy, and engaged
without fear in every kind of restless conduct, and murder, and
avarice; God imposed upon mankind the fear of man, as they did
not acknowledge the fear of God, in order that, being subjected
to the authority of men, and kept under restraint by their laws,
they might attain to some degree of justice, and exercise mutual
forbearance through dread of the sword suspended full in their
view, as the apostle says: "For he beareth not the sword
in vain; for he is the minister of God, the avenger for wrath
upon him who does evil." And for this reason too, magistrates
themselves, having laws as a clothing of righteousness whenever
they act in a just and legitimate manner, shall not be called
in question for their conduct, nor be liable to punishment. But
whatsoever they do to the subversion of justice, iniquitously,
and impiously, and illegally, and tyrannically, in these things
shall they also perish; for the just judgment of God comes equally
upon all, and in no case is defective. Earthly rule, therefore,
has been appointed by God for the benefit of nations,(9) and not
by the devil, who is never at rest at all, nay, who does not love
to see even nations conducting themselves after a quiet manner,
so that under the fear of human rule, men may not eat each other
up like fishes; but that, by means of the establishment of laws,
they may keep down an excess of wickedness among the nations.
And considered from this point of view, those who exact tribute
from us are "God's ministers, serving for this very purpose."
3. As, then, "the powers that be are ordained of God,"
it is clear that the devil lied when he said, "These are
delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will, I give them."
For by the law of the same Being as calls men into existence are
kings also appointed, adapted for those men who are at the time
placed under their government. Some of these [rulers] are given
for the correction and the benefit of their subjects, and for
the preservation of justice; but others, for the purposes of fear
and punishment and rebuke: others, as [the subjects] deserve it,
are for deception, disgrace, and pride; while the just judgment
of God, as I have observed already, passes equally upon all. The
devil, however, as he is the apostate angel, can only go to this
length, as he did at the beginning, [namely] to deceive and lead
astray the mind of man into disobeying the commandments of God,
and grad-
553
ually to darken the hearts of those who would endeavour to serve
him, to the forgetting of the true God, but to the adoration of
himself as God.
4. Just as if any one, being an apostate, and seizing in a
hostile manner another man's territory, should harass the inhabitants
of it, in order that he might claim for himself the glory of a
king among those ignorant of his apostasy and robbery; so likewise
also the devil, being one among those angels who are placed over
the spirit of the air, as the Apostle Paul has declared in his
Epistle to the Ephesians,(1) becoming envious of man, was rendered
an apostate from the divine law: for envy is a thing foreign to
God. And as his apostasy was exposed by man, and man became the
[means of] searching out his thoughts (et examinatio sententioe
ejus, homo factus est), he has set himself to this with greater
and greater determination, in opposition to man, envying his life,
and wishing to involve him in his own apostate power. The Word
of God, however, the Maker of all things, conquering him by means
of human nature, and showing him to be an apostate, has, on the
contrary, put him under the power of man. For He says, "Behold,
I confer upon you the power of treading upon serpents and scorpions,
and upon all the power of the enemy,"(2) in order that, as
he obtained dominion over man by apostasy, so again his apostasy
might be deprived of power by means of man turning back again
to God.
CHAP. XXV.--THE FRAUD, PRIDE, AND TYRANNICAL KINGDOM OF ANTICHRIST,
AS DESCRIBED BY DANIEL AND PAUL.
1. And not only by the particulars already mentioned, but
also by means of the events which shall occur in the time of Antichrist
is it shown that he, being an apostate and a robber, is anxious
to be adored as God; and that, although a mere slave, he wishes
himself to be proclaimed as a king. For he (Antichrist) being
endued with all the power of the devil, shall come, not as a righteous
king, nor as a legitimate king, [i.e., one] in subjection to God,
but an impious, unjust, and lawless one; as an apostate, iniquitous
and murderous; as a robber, concentrating in himself [all] satanic
apostasy, and setting aside idols to persuade [men] that he himself
is God, raising up himself as the only idol, having in himself
the multifarious errors of the other idols. This he does, in order
that they who do [now] worship the devil by means of many abominations,
may serve himself by this one idol, of whom the apostle thus speaks
in the second Epistle to the Thessalonians: "Unless there
shall come a failing away first, and the man of sin shall be revealed,
the son of perdition, who opposeth and exalteth himself above
all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he sitteth
in the temple of God, showing himself as if he were God."
The apostle therefore clearly points out his apostasy, and that
he is lifted up above all that is called God, or that is worshipped--that
is, above every idol--for these are indeed so called by men, but
are not [really] gods; and that he will endeavour in a tyrannical
manner to set himself forth as God.
2. Moreover, he (the apostle) has also pointed out this which
I have shown in many ways, that the temple in Jerusalem was made
by the direction of the true God. For the apostle himself, speaking
in his own person, distinctly called it the temple of God. Now
I have shown in the third book, that no one is termed God by the
apostles when speaking for themselves, except Him who truly is
God, the Father of our Lord, by whose directions the temple which
is at Jerusalem was constructed for those purposes which I have
already mentioned; in which [temple] the enemy shall sit, endeavouring
to show himself as Christ, as the Lord also declares: "But
when ye shall see the abomination of desolation, which has been
spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let
him that readeth understand), then let those who are in Judea
flee into the mountains; and he who is upon the house-top, let
him not come down to take anything out of his house: for there
shall then be great hardship, such as has not been from the beginning
of the world until now, nor ever shall be."(3)
3. Daniel too, looking forward to the end of the last kingdom,
i.e., the ten last kings, amongst whom the kingdom of those men
shall be partitioned, and upon whom the son of perdition shall
come, declares that ten horns shall spring from the beast, and
that another little horn shall arise in the midst of them, and
that three of the former shall be rooted up before his face. He
says: "And, behold, eyes were in this horn as the eyes of
a man, and a mouth speaking great things, and his look was more
stout than his fellows. I was looking, and this horn made war
against the saints, and prevailed against them, until the Ancient
of days came and gave judgment to the saints of the most high
God, and the time came, and the saints obtained the kingdom."(4)
Then, further on, in the interpretation of the vision, there was
said to him: "The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom
upon earth, which shall excel all other kingdoms, and devour the
whole earth, and tread it down, and cut it in pieces. And its
ten horns are ten kings which shall arise; and after them shall
arise another, who shall surpass in evil deeds all that were be-
554
fore him, and shall overthrow three kings; and he shall speak
words against the most high God, and wear out the saints of the
most high God, and shall purpose to change times and laws; and
[everything] shall be given into his hand until a time of times
and a half time,"(1) that is, for three years and six months,
during which time, when he comes, he shall reign over the earth.
Of whom also the Apostle Paul again, speaking in the second [Epistle]
to the Thessalonians, and at the same time proclaiming the cause
of his advent, thus says: "And then shall the wicked one
be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus shall slay with the spirit of
His mouth, and destroy by the presence of His coming; whose coming
[i.e., the wicked one's] is after the working of Satan, in all
power, and signs, and portents of lies, and with all deceivableness
of wickedness for those who perish; because they did not receive
the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And therefore
God will send them the working of error, that they may believe
a lie; that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth,
but gave consent to iniquity,"(2)
4. The Lord also spoke as follows to those who did not believe
in Him: "I have come in my Father's name, and ye have not
received Me: when another shall come in his own name, him ye will
receive,"(3) calling Antichrist "the other," because
he is alienated from the Lord. This is also the unjust judge,
whom the Lord mentioned as one "who feared not God, neither
regarded man,"(4) to whom the widow fled in her forgetfulness
of God,--that is, the earthly Jerusalem,--to be avenged of her
adversary. Which also he shall do in the time of his kingdom:
he shall remove his kingdom into that [city], and shall sit in
the temple of God, leading astray those who worship him, as if
he were Christ. To this purpose Daniel says again: "And he
shall desolate the holy place; and sin has been given for a sacrifice,(5)
and righteousness been cast away in the earth, and he has been
active (fecit), and gone on prosperously."(6) And the angel
Gabriel, when explaining his vision, states with regard to this
person: "And towards the end of their kingdom a king of a
most fierce countenance shall arise, one understanding [dark]
questions, and exceedingly powerful, full of wonders; and he shall
corrupt, direct, influence (faciet), and put strong men down,
the holy people likewise; and his yoke shall be directed as a
wreath [round their neck]; deceit shall be in his hand, and he
shall be lifted up in his heart: he shall also ruin many by deceit,
and lead many to perdition, bruising them in his hand like eggs."(7)
And then he points out the time that his tyranny shall last, during
which the saints shall be put to flight, they who offer a pure
sacrifice unto God: "And in the midst of the week,"
he says, "the sacrifice and the libation shall be taken away,
and the abomination of desolation [shall be brought] into the
temple: even unto the consummation of the time shall the desolation
be complete."(8) Now three years and six months constitute
the half-week.
5. From all these passages are revealed to us, not merely
the particulars of the apostasy, and [the doings] of him who concentrates
in himself every satanic error, but also, that there is one and
the same God the Father, who was declared by the prophets, but
made manifest by Christ. For if what Daniel prophesied concerning
the end has been confirmed by the Lord, when He said, "When
ye shall see the abomination of desolation, which has been spoken
of by Daniel the prophet"(9) (and the angel Gabriel gave
the interpretation of the visions to Daniel, and he is the archangel
of the Creator (Demiurgi), who also proclaimed to Mary the visible
coining and the incarnation of Christ), then one and the same
God is most manifestly pointed out, who sent the prophets, and
made promise(10) of the Son, and called us into His knowledge.
CHAP. XXVI.--JOHN AND DANIEL HAVE PREDICTED THE DISSOLUTION AND
DESOLATION OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, WHICH SHALL PRECEDE THE END OF
THE WORLD AND THE ETERNAL KINGDOM OF CHRIST. THE GNOSTICS ARE
REFUTED, THOSE TOOLS OF SATAN, WHO INVENT ANOTHER FATHER DIFFERENT
FROM THE CREATOR.
1. In a still clearer light has John, in the Apocalypse, indicated
to the Lord's disciples what shall happen in the last times, and
concerning the ten kings who shall then arise, among whom the
empire which now rules [the earth] shall be partitioned. He teaches
us what the ten horns shall be which were seen by Daniel, telling
us that thus it had been said to him: "And the ten horns
which thou sawest are ten kings, who have received no kingdom
as yet, but shall receive power as if kings one hour with the
beast. These have one mind, and give their strength and power
to the beast. These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb
shall overcome them, because He is the Lord of lords and the King
of kings."(11) It is manifest, therefore, that
555
of these [potentates], he who is to come shall slay three, and
subject the remainder to his power, and that he shall be himself
the eighth among them. And they shall lay Babylon waste, and burn
her with fire, and shall give their kingdom to the beast, and
put the Church to flight. After that they shall be destroyed by
the coming of our Lord. For that the kingdom must be divided,
and thus come to ruin, the Lord [declares when He] says: "Every
kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every
city or house divided against itself shall not stand."(1)
It must be, therefore, that the kingdom, the city, and the house
be divided into ten; and for this reason He has already foreshadowed
the partition and division [which shall take place]. Daniel also
says particularly, that the end of the fourth kingdom consists
in the toes of the image seen by Nebuchadnezzar, upon which came
the stone cut out without hands; and as he does himself say: "The
feet were indeed the one part iron, the other part clay, until
the stone was cut out without hands, and struck the image upon
the iron and clay feet, and dashed them into pieces, even to the
end."(2) Then afterwards, when interpreting this, he says:
"And as thou sawest the feet and the toes, partly indeed
of clay, and partly of iron, the kingdom shall be divided, and
there shall be in it a root of iron, as thou sawest iron mixed
with baked clay. And the toes were indeed the one part iron, but
the other part clay."(3) The ten toes, therefore, are these
ten kings, among whom the kingdom shall be partitioned, of whom
some indeed shall be strong and active, or energetic; others,
again, shall be sluggish and useless, and shall not agree; as
also Daniel says: "Some part of the kingdom shall be strong,
and part shall be broken from it. As thou sawest the iron mixed
with the baked clay, there shall be minglings among the human
race, but no cohesion one with the other, just as iron cannot
be welded on to pottery ware."(4) And since an end shall
take place, he says: "And in the days of these kings shall
the God of heaven raise up a kingdom which shall never decay,
and His kingdom shall not be left to another people. It shall
break in pieces and shatter all kingdoms, and shall itself be
exalted for ever. As thou sawest that the stone was cut without
hands from the mountain, and brake in pieces the baked clay, the
iron, the brass, the silver, and the gold, God has pointed out
to the king what shall come to pass after these things; and the
dream is true, and the interpretation trustworthy."(5)
2. If therefore the great God showed future things by Daniel,
and confirmed them by His Son; and if Christ is the stone which
is cut out without hands, who shall destroy temporal kingdoms,
and introduce an eternal one, which is the resurrection of the
just; as he declares, "The God of heaven shall raise up a
kingdom which shall never be destroyed,"--let those thus
confuted come to their senses, who reject the Creator (Demiurgum),
and do not agree that the prophets were sent beforehand from the
same Father from whom also the Lord came, but who assert that
prophecies originated from diverse powers. For those things which
have been predicted by the Creator alike through all the prophets
has Christ fulfilled in the end, ministering to His Father's will,
and completing His dispensations with regard to the human race.
Let those persons, therefore, who blaspheme the Creator, either
by openly expressed words, such as the disciples of Marcion, or
by a perversion of the sense [of Scripture], as those of Valentinus
and all the Gnostics falsely so called, be recognised as agents
of Satan by all those who worship God; through whose agency Satan
now, and not before, has been seen to speak against God, even
Him who has prepared eternal fire for every kind of apostasy.
For he did not venture to blaspheme his Lord openly of himself;
as also in the beginning he led man astray through the instrumentality
of the serpent, concealing himself as it were from God. Truly
has Justin remarked:(6) That before the Lord's appearance Satan
never dared to blaspheme God, inasmuch as he did not yet know
his own sentence, because it was contained in parables and allegories;
but that after the Lord's appearance, when he had clearly ascertained
from the words of Christ and His apostles that eternal fire has
been prepared for him as he apostatized from God of his own free-will,
and likewise for all who unrepentant continue in the apostasy,
he now blasphemes, by means of such men, the Lord who brings judgment
[upon him] as being already condemned, and imputes the guilt of
his apostasy to his Maker, not to his own voluntary disposition.
Just as it is with those who break the laws, when punishment overtakes
them: they throw the blame upon those who frame the laws, but
not upon themselves. In like manner do those men, filled with
a satanic spirit, bring innumerable accusations against our Creator,
who has both given to us the spirit of life, and established a
law adapted for all; and they will not admit that the judgment
of God is just. Wherefore also they set about imagining some other
Father who neither cares about nor exercises a providence
556
over our affairs, nay, one who even approves of all sins.
CHAP. XXVII.--THE FUTURE JUDGMENT BY CHRIST. COMMUNION WITH AND
SEPARATION FROM THE DIVINE BEING. THE ETERNAL PUNISHMENT OF UNBELIEVERS.
1. If the Father, then, does not exercise judgment, [it follows]
that judgment does not belong to Him, or that He consents to all
those actions which take place; and if He does not judge, all
persons will be equal, and accounted in the same condition. The
advent of Christ will therefore be without an object, yea, absurd,
inasmuch as [in that case] He exercises no judicial power. For
"He came to divide a man against his father, and the daughter
against the mother, and the daughter-in-law against the mother-in-law;"(1)
and when two are in one bed, to take the one, and to leave the
other; and of two women grinding at the mill, to take one and
leave the other:(2) [also] at the time of the end, to order the
reapers to collect first the tares together, and bind them in
bundles, and burn them with unquenchable fire, but to gather up
the wheat into the barn;(3) and to call the lambs into the kingdom
prepared for them, but to send the goats into everlasting fire,
which has been prepared by His Father for the devil and his angels.(4)
And why is this? Has the Word come for the ruin and for the resurrection
of many? For the ruin, certainly, of those who do not believe
Him, to whom also He has threatened a greater damnation in the
judgment-day than that of Sodom and Gomorrah;(5) but for the resurrection
of believers, and those who do the will of His Father in heaven.
If then the advent of the Son comes indeed alike to all, but is
for the purpose of judging, and separating the believing from
the unbelieving, since, as those who believe do His will agreeably
to their own choice, and as, [also] agreeably to their own choice,
the disobedient do not consent to His doctrine; it is manifest
that His Father has made all in a like condition, each person
having a choice of his own, and a free understanding; and that
He has regard to all things, and exercises a providence over all,
"making His sun to rise upon the evil and on the good, and
sending rain upon the just and unjust."(6)
2. And to as many as continue in their love towards God, does
He grant communion with Him. But communion with God is life and
light, and the enjoyment of all the benefits which He has in store.
But on as many as, according to their own choice, depart from
God. He inflicts that separation from Himself which they have
chosen of their own accord. But separation from God is death,
and separation from light is darkness; and separation from God
consists in the loss of all the benefits which He has in store.
Those, therefore, who cast away by apostasy these forementioned
things, being in fact destitute of all good, do experience every
kind of punishment. God, however, does not punish them immediately
of Himself, but that punishment falls upon them because they are
destitute of all that is good. Now, good things are eternal and
without end with God, and therefore the loss of these is also
eternal and never-ending. It is in this matter just as occurs
in the case of a flood of light: those who have blinded themselves,
or have been blinded by others, are for ever deprived of the enjoyment
of light. It is not, [however], that the light has inflicted upon
them the penalty of blindness, but it is that the blindness itself
has brought calamity upon them: and therefore the Lord declared,
"He that believeth in Me is not condemned,"(7) that
is, is not separated from God, for he is united to God through
faith. On the other hand, He says, "He that believeth not
is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name
of the only-begotten Son of God;" that is, he separated himself
from God of his own accord. "For this is the condemnation,
that light is come into this world, and men have loved darkness
rather than light. For every one who doeth evil hateth the light,
and cometh not to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may
be made manifest, that he has wrought them in God."
CHAP. XXVIII.--THE DISTINCTION TO BE MADE BETWEEN THE RIGHTEOUS
AND THE WICKED. THE FUTURE APOSTASY IN THE TIME OF ANTI-CHRIST,
AND THE END OF THE WORLD.
1. Inasmuch, then, as in this world (<greek>aiwni</greek>)
some persons betake themselves to the light, and by faith unite
themselves with God, but others shun the light, and separate themselves
from God, the Word of God comes preparing a fit habitation for
both. For those indeed who are in the light, that they may derive
enjoyment from it, and from the good things contained in it; but
for those in darkness, that they may partake in its calamities.
And on this account He says, that those upon the right hand are
called into the kingdom of heaven, but that those on the left
He will send into eternal fire for they have deprived themselves
of all good.
2. And for this reason the apostle says: "Be-
557
cause they received not the love of God, that they might be saved,
therefore God shall also send them the operation of error, that
they may believe a lie, that they all may be judged who have not
believed the truth, but consented to unrighteousness."(1)
For when he (Antichrist) is come, and of his own accord concentrates
in his own person the apostasy, and accomplishes whatever he shall
do according to his own will and choice, sitting also in the temple
of God, so that his dupes may adore him as the Christ; wherefore
also shall he deservedly "be cast into the lake of fire:"(2)
[this will happen according to divine appointment], God by His
prescience foreseeing all this, and at the proper time sending
such a man, "that they may believe a lie, that they all may
be judged who did not believe the truth, but consented to unrighteousness;"
whose coming John has thus described in the Apocalypse: "And
the beast which I had seen was like unto a leopard, and his feet
as of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion; and the dragon
conferred his own power upon him, and his throne, and great might.
And one of his heads was as it were slain unto death; and his
deadly wound was healed, and all the world wondered after the
beast. And they worshipped the dragon because he gave power to
the beast; and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like
unto this beast, and who is able to make war with him? And there
was given unto him a mouth speaking great things, and blasphemy
and power was given to him during forty and two months. And he
opened his mouth for blasphemy against God, to blaspheme His name
and His tabernacle, and those who dwell in heaven. And power was
given him over every tribe, and people, and tongue, and nation.
And all who dwell upon the earth worshipped him, [every one] whose
name was not written in the book of the Lamb slain from the foundation
of the world. If any one have ears, let him hear. If any one shall
lead into captivity, he shall go into captivity. If any shall
slay with the sword, he must be slain with the sword. Here is
the endurance and the faith of the saints."(3) After this
he likewise describes his armour-bearer, whom he also terms a
false prophet: "He spake as a dragon, and exercised all the
power of the first beast in his sight, and caused the earth, and
those that dwell therein, to adore the first beast, whose deadly
wound was healed. And he shall perform great wonders, so that
he can even cause fire to descend from heaven upon the earth in
the sight of men, and he shall lead the inhabitants of the earth
astray."(4) Let no one imagine that he performs these wonders
by divine power, but by the working of magic. And we must not
be surprised if, since the demons and apostate spirits are at
his service, he through their means performs wonders, by which
he leads the inhabitants of the earth astray. John says further:
"And he shall order an image of the beast to be made, and
he shall give breath to the image, so that the image shall speak;
and he shall cause those to be slain who will not adore it."
He says also: "And he will cause a mark [to be put] in the
forehead and in the fight hand, that no one may be able to buy
or sell, unless he who has the mark of the name of the beast or
the number of his name; and the number is six hundred and sixty-six,"(5)
that is, six times a hundred, six times ten, and six units. [He
gives this] as a summing up of the whole of that apostasy which
has taken place during six thousand years.
3. For in as many days as this world was made, in so many
thousand years shall it be concluded. And for this reason the
Scripture says: "Thus the heaven and the earth were finished,
and all their adornment. And God brought to a conclusion upon
the sixth day the works that He had made; and God rested upon
the seventh day from all His works."(6) This is an account
of the things formerly created, as also it is a prophecy of what
is to come. For the day of the Lord is as a thousand years;(7)
and in six days created things were completed: it is evident,
therefore, that they will come to an end at the sixth thousand
year.
4. And therefore throughout all time, man, having been moulded
at the beginning by the hands of God, that is, of the Son and
of the Spirit, is made after the image and likeness of God: the
chaff, indeed, which is the apostasy, being cast away; but the
wheat, that is, those who bring forth fruit to God in faith, being
gathered into the barn. And for this cause tribulation is necessary
for those who are saved, that having been after a manner broken
up, and rendered fine, and sprinkled over by the patience of the
Word of God, and set on fire [for purification], they may be fitted
for the royal banquet. As a certain man of ours said, when he
was condemned to the wild beasts because of his testimony with
respect to God: "I am the wheat of Christ, and am ground
by the teeth of the wild beasts, that I may be found the pure
bread of God."(8)
558
CHAP.XXIX.--ALL THINGS HAVE BEEN CREATED FOR THE SERVICE OF MAN.
THE DECEITS, WICKEDNESS, AND APOSTATE POWER OF ANTICHRIST. THIS
WAS PREFIGURED AT THE DELUGE, AS AFTERWARDS BY THE PERSECUTION
OF SHADRACH, MESHACH, AND ABEDNEGO.
1. In the previous books I have set forth the causes for which
God permitted these things to be made, and have pointed out that
all such have been created for the benefit of that human nature
which is saved, ripening for immortality that which is [possessed]
of its own free will and its own power, and preparing and rendering
it more adapted for eternal subjection to God. And therefore the
creation is suited to [the wants of] man; for man was not made
for its sake, but creation for the sake of man. Those nations
however, who did not of themselves raise up their eyes unto heaven,
nor returned thanks to their Maker, nor wished to behold the light
of truth, but who were like blind mice concealed in the depths
of ignorance, the word justly reckons "as waste water from
a sink, and as the turning-weight of a balance--in fact, as nothing;"(1)
so far useful and serviceable to the just, as stubble conduces
towards the growth of the wheat, and its straw, by means of combustion,
serves for working gold. And therefore, when in the end the Church
shall be suddenly caught up from this, it is said, "There
shall be tribulation such as has not been since the beginning,
neither shall be."(2) For this is the last contest of the
righteous, in which, when they overcome they are crowned with
incorruption.
2. And there is therefore in this beast, when he comes, a
recapitulation made of all sorts of iniquity and of every deceit,
in order that all apostate power, flowing into and being shut
up in him, may be sent into the furnace of fire. Fittingly, therefore,
shall his name possess the number six hundred and sixty-six, since
he sums up in his own person all the commixture of wickedness
which took place previous to the deluge, due to the apostasy of
the angels. For Noah was six hundred years old when the deluge
came upon the earth, sweeping away the rebellious world, for the
sake of that most infamous generation which lived in the times
of Noah. And [Antichrist] also sums up every error of devised
idols since the flood, together with the slaying of the prophets
and the cutting off of the just. For that image which was set
up by Nebuchadnezzar had indeed a height of sixty cubits, while
the breadth was six cubits; on account of which Ananias, Azarias,
and Misael, when they did not worship it, were cast into a furnace
of fire, pointing out prophetically, by what happened to them,
the wrath against the righteous which shall arise towards the
[time of the] end. For that image, taken as a whole, was a prefiguring
of this man's coming, decreeing that he should undoubtedly himself
alone be worshipped by all men. Thus, then, the six hundred years
of Noah, in whose time the deluge occurred because of the apostasy,
and the number of the cubits of the image for which these just
men were sent into the fiery furnace, do indicate the number of
the name of that man in whom is concentrated the whole apostasy
of six thousand years, and unrighteousness, and wickedness, and
false prophecy, and deception; for which things' sake a cataclysm
of fire shall also come [upon the earth].
CHAP. XXX.--ALTHOUGH CERTAIN AS TO THE NUMBER OF THE NAME OF ANTICHRIST,
YET WE SHOULD COME TO NO RASH CONCLUSIONS AS TO THE NAME ITSELF,
BECAUSE THIS NUMBER IS CAPABLE OF BEING FITTED TO MANY NAMES.
REASONS FOR THIS POINT BEING RESERVED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT. ANTICHRIST'S
REIGN AND DEATH.
1. Such, then, being the state of the case, and this number
being found in all the most approved and ancient copies(3) [of
the Apocalypse], and those men who saw John face to face bearing
their testimony [to it]; while reason also leads us to conclude
that the number of the name of the beast, [if reckoned] according
to the Greek mode of calculation by the [value of] the letters
contained in it, will amount to six hundred and sixty and six;
that is, the number of tens shall be equal to that of the hundreds,
and the number of hundreds equal to that of the units (for that
number which [expresses] the digit six being adhered to throughout,
indicates the recapitulations of that apostasy, taken in its full
extent, which occurred at the beginning, during the intermediate
periods, and which shall take place at the end),--I do not know
how it is that some have erred following the ordinary mode of
speech, and have vitiated the middle number in the name, deducting
the amount of fifty from it, so that instead of six decads they
will have it that there is but one. [I am inclined to think that
this occurred through the fault of the copyists, as is wont to
happen, since numbers also are expressed by letters; so that the
Greek letter which expresses the number sixty was easily expanded
into the letter Iota of the Greeks.](4) Others then received this
read-
559
ing without examination; some in their simplicity, and upon their
own responsibility, making use of this number expressing one decad;
while some, in their inexperience, have ventured to seek out a
name which should contain the erroneous and spurious number. Now,
as regards those who have done this in simplicity, and without
evil intent, we are at liberty to assume that pardon will be granted
them by God. But as for those who, for the sake of vainglory,
lay it down for certain that names containing the spurious number
are to be accepted, and affirm that this name, hit upon by themselves,
is that of him who is to come; such persons shall not come forth
without loss, because they have led into error both themselves
and those who confided in them. Now, in the first place, it is
loss to wander from the truth, and to imagine that as being the
case which is not; then again, as there shall be no light punishment
[inflicted] upon him who either adds or subtracts anything from
the Scripture,(1) under that such a person must necessarily fall.
Moreover, another danger, by no means trifling, shall overtake
those who falsely presume that they know the name of Antichrist.
For if these men assume one [number], when this [Antichrist] shall
come having another, they will be easily led away by him, as supposing
him not to be the expected one, who must be guarded against.
2. These men, therefore, ought to learn [what really is the
state of the case], and go back to the true number of the name,
that they be not reckoned among false prophets. But, knowing the
sure number declared by Scripture, that is, six hundred sixty
and six, let them await, in the first place, the division of the
kingdom into ten; then, in the next place, when these kings are
reigning, and beginning to set their affairs in order, and advance
their kingdom, [let them learn] to acknowledge that he who shall
come claiming the kingdom for himself, and shall terrify those
men of whom we have been speaking, having a name containing the
aforesaid number, is truly the abomination of desolation. This,
too, the apostle affirms: "When they shall say, Peace and
safety, then sudden destruction shall come upon them."(2)
And Jeremiah does not merely point out his sudden coming, but
he even indicates the tribe from which he shall come, where he
says, "We shall hear the voice of his swift horses from Dan;
the whole earth shall be moved by the voice of the neighing of
his galloping horses: he shall also come and devour the earth,
and the fulness thereof, the city also, and they that dwell therein."(3)
This, too, is the reason that this tribe is not reckoned in the
Apocalypse along with those which are saved.(4)
3. It is therefore more certain, and less hazardous, to await
the fulfilment of the prophecy, than to be making surmises, and
casting about for any names that may present themselves, inasmuch
as many names can be found possessing the number mentioned; and
the same question will, after all, remain unsolved. For if there
are many names found possessing this number, it will be asked
which among them shall the coming man bear. It is not through
a want of names containing the number of that name that I say
this, but on account of the fear of God, and zeal for the truth:
for the name Evanthas (E<greek>U</greek>AN<greek>Q</greek>A<greek>S</greek>)
contains the required number, but I make no allegation regarding
it. Then also Lateinos (<greek>L</greek>ATEINO<greek>S</greek>)
has the number six hundred and sixty-six; and it is a very probable
[solution], this being the name of the last kingdom [of the four
seen by Daniel]. For the Latins are they who at present bear rule:(5)
I will not, however, make any boast over this [coincidence]. Teitan
too, (TEITAN, the first syllable being written with the two Greek
vowels <greek>e</greek> and <greek>i</greek>),
among all the names which are found among us, is rather worthy
of credit. For it has in itself the predicted number, and is composed
of six letters, each syllable containing three letters; and [the
word itself] is ancient, and removed from ordinary use; for among
our kings we find none bearing this name Titan, nor have any of
the idols which are worshipped in public among the Greeks and
barbarians this appellation. Among many persons, too, this name
is accounted divine, so that even the sun is termed "Titan"
by those who do now possess [the rule]. This word, too, contains
a certain outward appearance of vengeance, and of one inflicting
merited punishment because he (Antichrist) pretends that he vindicates
the oppressed.(6) And besides this, it is an ancient name, one
worthy of credit, of royal dignity, and still further, a name
belonging to a tyrant. Inasmuch, then, as this name "Titan"
has so much to recommend it, there is a strong degree of probability,
that from among the many [names suggested], we infer, that perchance
he who is to come shall be called "Titan." We will not,
however, incur the risk of pronouncing positively as to the name
of Antichrist; for if it were necessary that his name should
be distinctly revealed in this present time, it would have been
announced by him who beheld the apocalyptic vision. For that was
seen no very long time
560
since, but almost in our day, towards the end of Domitian's reign.
4. But he indicates the number of the name now, that when
this man comes we may avoid him, being aware who he is: the name,
however, is suppressed, because it is not worthy of being proclaimed
by the Holy Spirit. For if it had been declared by Him, he (Antichrist)
might perhaps continue for a long period. But now as "he
was, and is not, and shall ascend out of the abyss, and goes into
perdition,"(1) as one who has no existence; so neither has
his name been declared, for the name of that which does not exist
is not proclaimed. But when this Antichrist shall have devastated
all things in this world, he will reign for three years and six
months, and sit in the temple at Jerusalem; and then the Lord
will come from heaven in the clouds, in the glory of the Father,
sending this man and those who follow him into the lake of fire;
but bringing in for the righteous the times of the kingdom, that
is, the rest, the hallowed seventh day; and restoring to Abraham
the promised inheritance, in which kingdom the Lord declared,
that "many coming from the east and from the west should
sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob."(2)
CHAP. XXXI.--THE PRESERVATION OF OUR BODIES IS CONFIRMED BY THE
RESURRECTION AND ASCENSION OF CHRIST: THE SOULS OF THE SAINTS
DURING THE INTERMEDIATE PERIOD ARE IN A STATE OF EXPECTATION OF
THAT TIME WHEN THEY SHALL RECEIVE THEIR PERFECT AND CONSUMMATED
GLORY.
1. Since, again, some who are reckoned among the orthodox
go beyond the pre-arranged plan for the exaltation of the just,
and are ignorant of the methods by which they are disciplined
beforehand for incorruption, they thus entertain heretical opinions.
For the heretics, despising the handiwork of God, and not admitting
the salvation of their flesh, while they also treat the promise
of God contemptuously, and pass beyond God altogether in the sentiments
they form, affirm that immediately upon their death they shall
pass above the heavens and the Demiurge, and go to the Mother
(Achamoth) or to that Father whom they have feigned. Those persons,
therefore, who disallow a resurrection affecting the whole man
(universam reprobant resurrectionem), and as far as in them lies
remove it from the midst [of the Christian scheme], how can they
be wondered at, if again they know nothing as to the plan of the
resurrection? For they do not choose to understand, that if these
things are as they say, the Lord Himself, in whom they profess
to believe, did not rise again upon the third day; but immediately
upon His expiring on the cross, undoubtedly departed on high,
leaving His body to the earth. But the case was, that for three
days He dwelt in the place where the dead were, as the prophet
says concerning Him: "And the Lord remembered His dead saints
who slept formerly in the land of sepulture; and He descended
to them, to rescue and save them."(3) And the Lord Himself
says, "As Jonas remained three days and three nights in the
whale's belly, so shall the Son of man be in the heart of the
earth."(4) Then also the apostle says, "But when He
ascended, what is it but that He also descended into the lower
parts of the earth?"(5) This, too, David says when prophesying
of Him, "And thou hast delivered my soul from the nethermost
hell;"(6) and on His rising again the third day, He said
to Mary, who was the first to see and to worship Him, "Touch
Me not, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to the
disciples, and say unto them, I ascend unto My Father, and unto
your Father."(7)
2. If, then, the Lord observed the law of the dead, that He
might become the first-begotten from the dead, and tarried until
the third day "in the lower parts of the earth;"(8)
then afterwards rising in the flesh, so that He even showed the
print of the nails to His disciples,(9) He thus ascended to the
Father;--[if all these things occurred, I say], how must these
men not be put to confusion, who allege that "the lower parts"
refer to this world of ours, but that their tuner man, leaving
the body here, ascends into the super-celestial place? For as
the Lord "went away in the midst of the shadow of death,"(10)
where the souls of the dead were, yet afterwards arose in the
body, and after the resurrection was taken up [into heaven], it
is manifest that the souls of His disciples also, upon whose account
the Lord underwent these things, shall go away into the invisible
place allotted to them by God, and there remain until the resurrection,
awaiting that event; then receiving their bodies, and rising in
their entirety, that is bodily, just as the Lord arose, they shall
come thus into the presence of God. "For no disciple is above
the Master, but every one that is perfect shall be as his Master."(11)
As our Master, therefore, did not at once depart, taking flight
[to heaven], but awaited the time of His resurrection prescribed
by the Father, which had been also shown forth through Jonas,
and rising again after three days was taken up [to heaven];
561
so ought we also to await the time of our resurrection prescribed
by God and foretold by the prophets, and so, rising, be taken
up, as many as the Lord shall account worthy of this [privilege].(1)
CHAP. XXXII.--IN THAT FLESH IN WHICH THE SAINTS HAVE SUFFERED
SO MANY AFFLICTIONS, THEY SHALL RECEIVE THE FRUITS OF THEIR LABOURS;
ESPECIALLY SINCE ALL CREATION WAITS FOR THIS, AND GOD PROMISES
IT TO ABRAHAM AND HIS SEED.
1. Inasmuch, therefore, as the opinions of certain [orthodox
persons] are derived from heretical discourses, they are both
ignorant of God's dispensations, and of the mystery of the resurrection
of the just, and of the [earthly] kingdom which is the commencement
of incorruption, by means of which kingdom those who shall be
worthy are accustomed gradually to partake of the divine nature
(capere Deum(2)); and it is necessary to tell them respecting
those things, that it behoves the righteous first to receive the
promise of the inheritance which God promised to the fathers,
and to reign in it, when they rise again to behold God in this
creation which is renovated, and that the judgment should take
place afterwards. For it is just that in that very creation in
which they toiled or were afflicted, being proved in every way
by suffering, they should receive the reward of their suffering;
and that in the creation in which they were slain because of their
love to God, in that they should be revived again; and that in
the creation in which they endured servitude, in that they should
reign. For God is rich in all things, and all things are His.
It is fitting, therefore, that the creation itself, being restored
to its primeval condition, should without restraint be under the
dominion of the righteous; and the apostle has made this plain
in the Epistle to the Romans, when he thus speaks: "For the
expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the
sons of God. For the creature has been subjected to vanity, not
willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in
hope; since the creature itself shall also be delivered from the
bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the sons of
God."(3)
2. Thus, then, the promise of God, which He gave to Abraham,
remains stedfast. For thus He said: "Lift up thine eyes,
and look from this place where now thou art, towards the north
and south, and east and west. For all the earth which thou seest,
I will give to thee and to thy seed, even for ever."(4) And
again He says, "Arise, and go through the length and breadth
of the land, since I will give it unto thee;"(5) and [yet]
he did not receive an inheritance in it, not even a footstep,
but was always a stranger and a pilgrim therein.(6) And upon the
death of Sarah his wife, when the Hittites were willing to bestow
upon him a place where he might bury her, he declined it as a
gift, but bought the burying-place (giving for it four hundred
talents of silver) from Ephron the son of Zohar the Hittite.(7)
Thus did he await patiently the promise of God, and was unwilling
to appear to receive from men, what God had promised to give him,
when He said again to him as follows: "I will give this land
to thy seed, from the river of Egypt even unto the great river
Euphrates."(8) If, then, God promised him the inheritance
of the land, yet he did not receive it during all the time of
his sojourn there, it must be, that together with his seed, that
is, those who fear God and believe in Him, he shall receive it
at the resurrection of the just. For his seed is the Church, which
receives the adoption to God through the Lord, as John the Baptist
said: "For God is able from the stones to raise up children
to Abraham."(9) Thus also the apostle says in the Epistle
to the Galatians: "But ye, brethren, as Isaac was, are the
children of the promise."(10) And again, in the same Epistle,
he plainly declares that they who have believed in Christ do receive
Christ, the promise to Abraham thus saying, "The promises
were spoken to Abraham, and to his seed. Now He does not say,
And of seeds, as if [He spake] of many, but as of one, And to
thy seed, which is Christ."(11) And again, confirming his
former words, he says, "Even as Abraham believed God, and
it was accounted to him for righteousness. Know ye therefore,
that they which are of faith are the children of Abraham. But
the Scripture, fore-seeing that God would justify the heathen
through faith, declared to Abraham beforehand, That in thee shall
all nations be blessed. So then they which are of faith shall
be blessed with faithful Abraham."(12) Thus, then, they who
are of faith shall be blessed with faithful Abraham, and these
are the children of Abraham. Now God made promise of the earth
to Abraham and his seed; yet neither Abraham nor his seed, that
is, those who are justified by faith, do now receive any
562
inheritance in it; but they shall receive it at the resurrection
of the just. For God is true and faithful; and on this account
He said, "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the
earth."(1)
CHAP. XXXIII.--FURTHER PROOFS OF THE SAME PROPOSITION, DRAWN FROM
THE PROMISES MADE BY CHRIST, WHEN HE DECLARED THAT HE WOULD DRINK
OF THE FRUIT OF THE VINE WITH HIS DISCIPLES IN HIS FATHER'S KINGDOM,
WHILE AT THE SAME TIME HE PROMISED TO REWARD THEM AN HUNDRED-FOLD,
AND TO MAKE THEM PARTAKE OF BANQUETS. THE BLESSING PRONOUNCED
BY JACOB HAD POINTED OUT THIS ALREADY, AS PAPIAS AND THE ELDERS
HAVE INTERPRETED IT.
1. For this reason, when about to undergo His sufferings,
that He might declare to Abraham and those with him the glad tidings
of the inheritance being thrown open, [Christ], after He had given
thanks while holding the cup, and had drunk of it, and given it
to the disciples, said to them: "Drink ye all of it: this
is My blood of the new covenant, which shall be shed for many
for the remission of sins. But I say unto you, I will not drink
henceforth of the fruit of this vine, until that day when I will
drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom."(2) Thus, then,
He will Himself renew the inheritance of the earth, and will re-organize
the mystery of the glory of [His] sons; as David says, "He
who hath renewed the face of the earth."(3) He promised to
drink of the fruit of the vine with His disciples, thus indicating
both these points: the inheritance of the earth in which the new
fruit of the vine is drunk, and the resurrection of His disciples
in the flesh. For the new flesh which rises again is the same
which also received the new cup. And He cannot by any means be
understood as drinking of the fruit of the vine when settled down
with his [disciples] above in a super-celestial place; nor, again,
are they who drink it devoid of flesh, for to drink of that which
flows from the vine pertains to flesh, and not spirit.
2. And for this reason the Lord declared, "When thou
makest a dinner or a supper, do not call thy friends, nor thy
neighbours, nor thy kinsfolk, lest they ask thee in return, and
so repay thee. But call the lame, the blind, and the poor, and
thou shall be blessed, since they cannot recompense thee, but
a recompense shall be made thee at the resurrection of the just."(4)
And again He says, "Whosoever shall have left lands, or houses,
or parents, or brethren, or children because of Me, he shall receive
in this world an hundred-fold, and in that to come he shall inherit
eternal life."(5) For what are the hundred-fold [rewards]
in this word, the entertainments given to the poor, and the suppers
for which a return is made? These are [to take place] in the times
of the kingdom, that is, upon the seventh day, which has been
sanctified, in which God rested from all the works which He created,
which is the true Sabbath of the righteous, which they shall not
be engaged in any earthly occupation; but shall have a table at
hand prepared for them by God, supplying them with all sorts of
dishes.
3. The blessing of Isaac with which he blessed his younger
son Jacob has the same meaning, when he says, "Behold, the
smell of my son is as the smell of a full field which the Lord
has blessed."(6) But "the field is the world."(7)
And therefore he added, "God give to thee of the dew of heaven,
and of the fatness of the earth, plenty of corn and wine. And
let the nations serve thee, and kings bow down to thee; and be
thou lord over thy brother, and thy father's sons shall bow down
to thee: cursed shall be he who shall curse thee, and blessed
shall be he who shall bless thee."(8) If any one, then, does
not accept these things as referring to the appointed kingdom,
he must fall into much contradiction and contrariety, as is the
case with the Jews, who are involved in absolute perplexity. For
not only did not the nations in this life serve this Jacob; but
even after he had received the blessing, he himself going forth
[from his home], served his uncle Laban the Syrian for twenty
years;(9) and not only was he not made lord of his brother, but
he did himself bow down before his brother Esau, upon his return
from Mesopotamia to his father, and offered many gifts to him.(10)
Moreover, in what way did he inherit much corn and wine here,
he who emigrated to Egypt because of the famine which possessed
the land in which he was dwelling, and became Subject to Pharaoh,
who was then ruling over Egypt? The predicted blessing, therefore,
belongs unquestionably to the times of the kingdom, when the righteous
shall bear rule upon their rising from the dead;(11) when also
the creation, having been renovated and set free, shall fructify
with an abundance of all kinds of food, from the dew of heaven,
and from the fertility of the earth: as the elders who saw John,
the disciple of the Lord, related that they had heard
563
from him how the Lord used to teach in regard to these times,
and say: The days will come, in which vines shall grow, each having
ten thousand branches, and in each branch ten thousand twigs,
and in each true(1) twig ten thousand shoots, and in each one
of the shoots ten thousand dusters, and on every one of the clusters
ten thousand grapes, and every grape when pressed will give five
and twenty metretes of wine. And when any one of the saints shall
lay hold of a cluster,(2) another shall cry out, "I am a
better cluster, take me; bless the Lord through me." In like
manner [the Lord declared] that a grain of wheat would produce
ten thousand ears, and that every ear should have ten thousand
grains, and every grain would yield ten pounds (quinque bilibres)
of clear, pure, fine flour; and that all other fruit-bearing trees,(3)
and seeds and grass, would produce in similar proportions (secundum
congruentiam iis consequentem); and that all animals feeding [only]
on the productions of the earth, should [in those days] become
peaceful and harmonious among each other, and be in perfect subjection
to man.
4. And these things are bone witness to in writing by Papias,
the hearer of John, and a companion of Polycarp, in his fourth
book; for there were five books compiled (<greek>suntetagmena</greek>)
by him.(4) And he says in addition, "Now these things are
credible to believers." And he says that, "when the
traitor Judas did not give credit to them, and put the question,
'How then can things about to bring forth so abundantly be wrought
by the Lord?' the Lord declared, 'They who shall come to these
[times] shall see.'" When prophesying of these times, therefore,
Esaias says: "The wolf also shall feed with the lamb, and
the leopard shall take his rest with the kid; the calf also, and
the bull, and the lion shall eat together; and a little boy shall
lead them. The ox and the bear shall feed together, and their
young ones shall agree together; and the lion shall eat straw
as well as the ox. And the infant boy shall thrust his hand into
the asp's den, into the nest also of the adder's brood; and they
shall do no harm, nor have power to hurt anything in my holy mountain."
And again he says, in recapitulation, "Wolves and lambs shall
then browse together, and the lion shall eat straw like the ox,
and the serpent earth as if it were bread; and they shall neither
hurt nor annoy anything in my holy mountain, saith the Lord."(5)
I am quite aware that some persons endeavour to refer these words
to the case of savage men, both of different nations and various
habits, who come to believe, and when they have believed, act
in harmony with the righteous. But although this is [true] now
with regard to some men coming from various nations to the harmony
of the faith, nevertheless in the resurrection of the just [the
words shall also apply] to those animals mentioned. For God is
non in all things. And it is right that when the creation is restored,
all the animals should obey and be in subjection to man, and revert
to the food originally given by God (for they had been originally
subjected in obedience to Adam), that is, the productions of the
earth. But some other occasion, and not the present, is [to be
sought] for showing that the lion shall [then] feed on straw.
And this indicates the large size and rich quality of the fruits.
For if that animal, the lion, feeds upon straw [at that period],
of what a quality must the wheat itself be whose straw shall serve
as suitable food for lions?
CHAP. XXXIV.--HE FORTIFIES HIS OPINIONS WITH REGARD TO THE TEMPORAL
AND EARTHLY KINGDOM OF THE SAINTS AFTER THEIR RESURRECTION, BY
THE VARIOUS TESTIMONIES OF ISAIAH, EZEKIEL, JEREMIAH, AND DANIEL;
ALSO BY THE PARABLE OF THE SERVANTS WATCHING, TO WHOM THE LORD
PROMISED THAT HE WOULD MINISTER.
1. Then, too, Isaiah himself has plainly declared that there
shall be joy of this nature at the resurrection of the just, when
he says: "The dead shall rise again; those, too, who are
in the tombs shall arise, and those who are in the earth shall
rejoice. For the dew from Thee is health to them."(6) And
this again Ezekiel also says: "Behold, I will open your tombs,
and will bring you forth out of your graves; when I will draw
my people from the sepulchres, and I will put breath in you, and
ye shall live; and I will place you on your own land, and ye shall
know that I am the LORD."(7) And again the same speaks thus:
"These things saith the LORD, I will gather Israel from all
nations whither they have been driven, and I shall be sanctified
in them in the sight of the sons of the nations: and they shall
dwell in their own land, which I gave to my servant Jacob. And
they shall dwell in it in peace; and they shall build houses,
and plant vineyards, and dwell in hope, when I shall cause judgment
to fall among all who have dishonoured them, among those who encircle
them round about; and they shall know that I am the LORD their
God, and the God of their fathers."(8) Now I have shown a
short time ago that the church is the seed of Abraham; and for
this reason, that we may know that He who in the New Testament
"raises up from the stones children unto
564
Abraham,"(1) is He who will gather, according to the Old
Testament, those that shall be saved from all the nations, Jeremiah
says: "Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that they shall
no more say, The LORD liveth, who led the children of Israel from
the north, and from every region whither they had been driven;
He will restore them to their own land which He gave to their
fathers."(2)
2. That the whole creation shall, according to God's will,
obtain a vast increase, that it may bring forth and sustain fruits
such [as we have mentioned], Isaiah declares: "And there
shall be upon every high mountain, and upon every prominent hill,
water running everywhere in that day, when many shall perish,
when walls shall fall. And the light of the moon shall be as the
light of the sun, seven times that of the day, when He shall heal
the anguish of His people, and do away with the pain of His stroke."(3)
Now "the pain of the stroke" means that inflicted at
the beginning upon disobedient man in Adam, that is, death; which
[stroke] the Lord will heal when He raises us from the dead, and
restores the inheritance of the fathers, as Isaiah again says:
"And thou shall be confident in the LORD, and He will cause
thee to pass over the whole earth, and feed thee with the inheritance
of Jacob thy father."(4) This is what the Lord declared:
"Happy are those servants whom the Lord when He cometh shall
find watching. Verily I say unto you, that He shall gird Himself,
and make them to sit down [to meat], and will come forth and serve
them. And if He shall come in the evening watch, and find them
so, blessed are they, because He shall make them sit down, and
minister to them; or if this be in the second, or it be in the
third, blessed are they."(5) Again John also says the very
same in the Apocalypse: "Blessed and holy is he who has part
in the first resurrection."(6) Then, too, Isaiah has declared
the time when these events shall occur; he says: "And I said,
Lord, how long? Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant,
and the houses be without men, and the earth be left a desert.
And after these things the LORD shall remove us men far away (longe
nos faciet Deus homines), and those who shall remain shall multiply
upon the earth."(7) Then Daniel also says this very thing:
"And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of those
under the heaven, is given to the saints of the Most High God,
whose kingdom is everlasting, and all dominions shall serve and
obey Him."(8) And lest the promise named should be understood
as referring to this time, it was declared to the prophet: "And
come thou, and stand in thy lot at the consummation of the days."(9)
3. Now, that the promises were not announced to the prophets
and the fathers alone, but to the Churches united to these from
the nations, whom also the Spirit terms "the islands"
(both because they are established in the midst of turbulence,
suffer the storm of blasphemies, exist as a harbour of safety
to those in peril, and are the refuge of those who love the height
[of heaven], and strive to avoid Bythus, that is, the depth of
error), Jeremiah thus declares: "Hear the word of the LORD,
ye nations, and declare it to the isles afar off; say ye, that
the LORD will scatter Israel, He will gather him, and keep him,
as one feeding his flock of sheep. For the Lord hath redeemed
Jacob, and rescued him from the hand of one stronger than he.
And they shall come and rejoice m Mount Zion, and shall come to
what is good, and into a land of wheat, and wine, and fruits,
of animals and of sheep; and their soul shall be as a tree bearing
fruit, and they shall hunger no more. At that time also shall
the virgins rejoice in the company of the young men: the old men,
too, shall be glad, and I will turn their sorrow into joy; and
I will make them exult, and will magnify them, and satiate the
souls of the priests the sons of Levi; and my people shall be
satiated with my goodness."(10) Now, in the preceding book(11)
I have shown that all the disciples of the Lord are Levites and
priests, they who used in the temple to profane the Sabbath, but
are blameless.(12) Promises of such a nature, therefore, do indicate
in the clearest manner the feasting of that creation in the kingdom
of the righteous, which God promises that He will Himself serve.
4. Then again, speaking of Jerusalem, and of Him reigning
there, Isaiah declares, "Thus saith the LORD, Happy is he
who hath seed in Zion, and servants in Jerusalem. Behold, a righteous
king shall reign, and princes shall rule with judgment"(13)
And with regard to the foundation on which it shall be rebuilt,
he says: "Behold, I will lay in order for thee a carbuncle
stone, and sapphire for thy foundations; and I will lay thy ramparts
with jasper, and thy gates with crystal, and thy wall with choice
stones: and all thy children shall be taught of God, and great
shall be the peace of thy children; and in righteousness shalt
thou be built up."(14) And yet again
565
does he say the same thing: "Behold, I make Jerusalem a rejoicing,
and my people [a joy]; for the voice of weeping shall be no more
heard in her, nor the voice of crying. Also there shall not be
there any immature [one], nor an old man who does not fulfil his
time: for the youth shall be of a hundred years; and the sinner
shall die a hundred years old, yet shall be accursed. And they
shall build houses, and inhabit them themselves; and shall plant
vineyards, and eat the fruit of them themselves, and shall drink
wine. And they shall not build, and others inhabit; neither shall
they prepare the vineyard, and others eat. For as the days of
the tree of life shall be the days of the people in thee; for
the works of their hands shall endure."(1)
CHAP. XXXV.--HE CONTENDS THAT THESE TESTIMONIES ALREADY ALLEGED
CANNOT BE UNDERSTOOD ALLEGORICALLY OF CELESTIAL BLESSINGS, BUT
THAT THEY SHALL HAVE THEIR FULFILMENT AFTER THE COMING OF ANTICHRIST,
AND THE RESURRECTION, IN THE TERRESTRIAL JERUSALEM. TO THE FORMER
PROPHECIES HE SUBJOINS OTHERS DRAWN FROM ISAIAH, JEREMIAH, AND
THE APOCALYPSE OF JOHN.
1. If, however, any shall endeavour to allegorize [prophecies]
of this kind, they shall not be found consistent with themselves
in all points, and shall be confuted by the teaching of the very
expressions [in question]. For example: "When the cities"
of the Gentiles "shall be desolate, so that they be not
inhabited, and the houses so that there shall be no men in them
and the land shall be left desolate."(2) "For, behold,"
says Isaiah, "the day of the LORD cometh past remedy, full
of fury and wrath, to lay waste the city of the earth, and to
root sinners out of it."(3) And again he says, "Let
him be taken away, that he behold not the glory of God."(4)
And when these things are done, he says, "God will remove
men far away, and those that are left shall multiply in the earth."(5)
"And they shall build houses, and shall inhabit them themselves:
and plant vineyards, and eat of them themselves."(6) For
all these and other words were unquestionably spoken in reference
to the resurrection of the just, which takes place after the coming
of Antichrist, and the destruction of all nations under his rule;
in [the times of] which [resurrection] the righteous shall reign
in the earth, waxing stronger by the sight of the Lord: and through
Him they shall become accustomed to partake in the glory of God
the Father, and shall enjoy in the kingdom intercourse and communion
with the holy angels, and union with spiritual beings; and [with
respect to] those whom the Lord shall find in the flesh, awaiting
Him from heaven, and who have suffered tribulation, as well as
escaped the hands of the Wicked one. For it is in reference to
them that the prophet says: "And those that are left shall
multiply upon the earth," And Jeremiah(7) the prophet has
pointed out, that as many believers as God has prepared for this
purpose, to multiply those left upon earth, should both be under
the rule of the saints to minister to this Jerusalem, and that
[His] kingdom shall be in it, saying, "Look around Jerusalem
towards the east, and behold the joy which comes to thee from
God Himself. Behold, thy sons shall come whom thou hast sent forth:
they shall come in a band from the east even unto the west, by
the word of that Holy One, rejoicing in that splendour which is
from thy God. O Jerusalem, put off thy robe of mourning and of
affliction, and put on that beauty of eternal splendour from thy
God. Gird thyself with the double garment of that righteousness
proceeding from thy God; place the mitre of eternal glory upon
thine head. For God will show thy glory to the whole earth under
heaven. For thy name shall for ever be called by God Himself,
the peace of righteousness and glory to him that worships God.
Arise, Jerusalem, stand on high, and look towards the east, and
behold thy sons from the rising of the sun, even to the west,
by the Word of that Holy One, rejoicing in the very remembrance
of God. For the footmen have gone forth from thee, while they
were drawn away by the enemy. God shall bring them in to thee,
being borne with glory as the throne of a kingdom. For God has
decreed that every high mountain shall be brought low, and the
eternal hills, and that the valleys be filled, so that the surface
of the earth be rendered smooth, that Israel, the glory of God,
may walk in safety. The woods, too, shall make shady places, and
every sweet-smelling tree shall be for Israel itself by the command
of God. For God shall go before with joy in the light of His splendour,
with the pity and righteousness which proceeds from Him."
2. Now all these things being such as they are, cannot be
understood in reference to super-celestial matters; "for
God," it is said, "will show to the whole earth that
is under heaven thy glory." But in the times of the kingdom,
the earth has been called again by Christ [to its pristine condition],
and Jerusalem rebuilt after the pattern of the Jerusalem above,
of which the prophet Isaiah says, "Behold, I have depicted
thy walls upon my hands, and thou art always in
566
my sight,"(1) And the apostle, too, writing to the Galatians,
says in like manner, "But the Jerusalem which is above is
free, which is the mother of us all."(2) He does not say
this with any thought of an erratic AEon, or of any other power
which departed from the Pleroma, or of Prunicus, but of the Jerusalem
which has been delineated on [God's] hands. And in the Apocalypse
John saw this new [Jerusalem] descending upon the new earth.(3)
For after the times of the kingdom, he says, "I saw a great
white throne, and Him who sat upon it, from whose face the earth
fled away, and the heavens; and there was no more place for them."(4)
And he sets forth, too, the things connected with the general
resurrection and the judgment, mentioning "the dead, great
and small." "The sea," he says, "gave up the
dead which it had in it, and death and hell delivered up the dead
that they contained; and the books were opened. Moreover,"
he says, "the book of life was opened, and the dead were
judged out of those things that were written in the books, according
to their works; and death and hell were sent into the lake of
fire, the second death."(5) Now this is what is called Gehenna,
which the Lord styled eternal fire.(6) "And if any one,"
it is said, "was not found written in the book of life, he
was sent into the lake of fire."(7) And after this, he says,
"I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven
and earth have passed away; also there was no more sea. And I
saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from heaven, as
a bride adorned for her husband." "And I heard,"
it is said, "a great voice from the throne, saying, Behold,
the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them;
and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them
as their God. And He will wipe away every tear from their eyes;
and death shall be no more, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither
shall there be any more pain, because the former things have passed
away."(8) Isaiah also declares the very same: "For there
shall be a new heaven and a new earth; and there shall be no remembrance
of the former, neither shall the heart think about them, but they
shall find in it joy and exultation."(9) Now this is what
has been said by the apostle: "For the fashion of this world
passeth away."(10) To the same purpose did the Lord also
declare, "Heaven and earth shall pass away."(11) When
these things, therefore, pass away above the earth, John, the
Lord's disciple, says that the new Jerusalem above shall [then]
descend, as a bride adorned for her husband; and that this is
the tabernacle of God, in which God will dwell with men. Of this
Jerusalem the former one is an image--that Jerusalem of the former
earth in which the righteous are disciplined beforehand for incorruption
and prepared for salvation. And of this tabernacle Moses received
the pattern in the mount;(12) and nothing is capable of being
allegorized, but all things are stedfast, and true, land substantial,
having been made by God for righteous men's enjoyment. For as
it is God truly who raises up man, so also does man truly rise
from the dead, and not allegorically, as I have shown repeatedly.
And as he rises actually, so also shall he be actually disciplined
beforehand for incorruption, and shall go forwards and flourish
in the times of the kingdom, in order that he may be capable of
receiving the glory of the Father. Then, when all things are made
new, he shall truly dwell in the city of God. For it is said,
"He that sitteth on the throne said, Behold, I make all things
new. And the Lord says, Write all this; for these words are faithful
and true. And He said to me, They are done."(13) And this
is the truth of the matter.
CHAP. XXXVI.--MEN SHALL BE ACTUALLY RAISED: THE WORLD SHALL NOT
BE ANNIHILATED; BUT THERE SHALL BE VARIOUS MANSIONS FOR THE SAINTS,
ACCORDING TO THE RANK ALLOTTED TO EACH INDIVIDUAL. ALL THINGS
SHALL BE SUBJECT TO GOD THE FATHER, AND SO SHALL HE BE ALL IN
ALL.
1. For since there are real men, so must there also be a real
establishment (plantationem), that they vanish not away among
non-existent things, but progress among those which have an actual
existence. For neither is the substance nor the essence of the
creation annihilated (for faithful and true is He who has established
it), but "the fashion of the world passeth away;"(14)
that is, those things among which transgression has occurred,
since man has grown old in them. And therefore this [present]
fashion has been formed temporary, God foreknowing all things;
as I have pointed out in the preceding book,(15) and have also
shown, as far as was possible, the cause of the creation of this
world of temporal things. But when this [present] fashion [of
things] passes away, and man has been renewed, and flourishes
in an incorruptible state, so as to preclude the possibility of
becoming old, [then] there shall be the new heaven and the new
earth, in which the new man shall remain [con-
567
tinually], always holding fresh converse with God. And since (or,
that) these things shall ever continue without end, Isaiah declares,
"For as the new heavens and the new earth which I do make,
continue in my sight, saith the LORD, so shall your seed and your
name remain."(1) And as the presbyters say, Then those who
are deemed worthy of an abode in heaven shall go there, others
shall enjoy the delights of paradise, and others shall possess
the splendour of the city; for everywhere the Saviour(2) shall
be seen according as they who see Him shall be worthy.
2. [They say, moreover], that there is this distinction between
the habitation of those who produce an hundred-fold, and that
of those who produce sixty-fold, and that of those who produce
thirty-fold: for the first will be taken up into the heavens,
the second will dwell in paradise, the last will inhabit the city;
and that was on this account the Lord declared, "In My Father's
house are many mansions."(3) For all things belong to God,
who supplies all with a suitable dwelling-place; even as His Word
says, that a share is allotted to all by the Father, according
as each person is or shall be worthy. And this is the couch on
which the guests shall recline, having been invited to the wedding.(4)
The presbyters, the disciples of the apostles, affirm that this
is the gradation and arrangement of those who are saved, and that
they advance through steps of this nature; also that they ascend
through the Spirit to the Son, and through the Son to the Father,
and that in due time the Son will yield up His work to the Father,
even as it is said by the apostle, "For He must reign till
He hath put all enemies under His feet. The last enemy that shall
be destroyed is death."(5) For in the times of the kingdom,
the righteous man who is upon the earth shall then forget to die.
"But when He saith, All things shall be subdued unto Him,
it is manifest that He is excepted who did put all things under
Him. And when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall
the Son also Himself be subject unto Him who put all things under
Him, that God may be all in all."(6)
3. John, therefore, did distinctly foresee the first "resurrection
of the just,"(7) and the inheritance in the kingdom of the
earth; and what the prophets have prophesied concerning it harmonize
[with his vision]. For the Lord also taught these things, when
He promised that He would have the mixed cup new with His disciples
in the kingdom. The apostle, too, has confessed that the creation
shall be free from the bondage of corruption, [so as to pass]
into the liberty of the sons of God.(8) And in all these things,
and by them all, the same God the Father is manifested, who fashioned
man, and gave promise of the inheritance of the earth to the fathers,
who brought it (the creature) forth [from bondage] at the resurrection
of the just, and fulfils the promises for the kingdom of His Son;
subsequently bestowing in a paternal manner those things which
neither the eye has seen, nor the ear has heard, nor has [thought
concerning them] arisen within the heart of man,(9) For there
is the one Son, who accomplished His Father's will; and one human
race also in which the mysteries of God are wrought, "which
the angels desire to look into;"(10) and they are not able
to search out the wisdom of God, by means of Which His handiwork,
confirmed and incorporated with His Son, is brought to perfection;
that His offspring, the First-begotten Word, should descend to
the creature (facturam), that is, to what had been moulded (plasma),
and that it should be contained by Him; and, on the other hand,
the creature should contain the Word, and ascend to Him, passing
beyond the angels, and be made after the image and likeness of
God.(11)
|
