Moses himself was the first to recognize how august and glorious, beyond all else, was the name of Christ. When he handed on the heavenly patterns and symbols and mysterious images—following the oracle which said to him, 「See that thou make all things according to the pattern that was shown thee in the mount」—he, designating a man, so far as was possible, as high priest of God, proclaims this man 「Christ」 (Anointed). And to this dignity of the high priesthood, which in his eyes surpassed every pre-eminence among men, he attaches the name of Christ for honour and glory. Thus, then, did he know that Christ was something divine.
The same man, foreseeing very well by the divine Spirit the appellation of Jesus also, deemed it too worthy of a certain exceptional privilege. Never before having been uttered among men until it was made known to Moses, the title of Jesus is bestowed by Moses first and only upon him whom he knew, again as a type and symbol, would succeed to the rule over all after his own death.
Indeed, his successor, who had not before borne the appellation of Jesus, but was called by another name, Auses, which his parents had given him—him Moses himself proclaims 「Jesus,」 bestowing on him the name as an honourable prize far greater than any royal diadem; because that very Jesus son of Nave bore the image of our Saviour, who alone, after Moses and the completion of the symbolic worship handed down through him, succeeded to the headship of the true and most pure religion.
And Moses, in this way, upon two men who in his day surpassed all the people in virtue and glory—the one as high priest, the other as the one to rule after him—conferred for the highest honour the appellation of our Saviour Jesus Christ.
And clearly the prophets after these too proclaim Christ beforehand by name, at the same time testifying in advance both to the conspiracy of the Jewish people that was to come against him, and to the calling of the nations through him. At one time Jeremiah speaks somewhat thus: 「The breath of our nostrils, the Lord's Anointed, was taken in their corruptions, of whom we said, Under his shadow we shall live among the nations.」 At another time David, perplexed, speaks through these words: 「Why did the nations rage, and the peoples meditate vain things? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his Anointed.」 To which he adds, in the very person of Christ: 「The Lord said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I will give thee the nations for thine inheritance, and the ends of the earth for thy possession.」
So then it was not only those honoured with the high priesthood, anointed for the symbol's sake with specially prepared oil, that the name of Christ adorned among the Hebrews, but also the kings, whom likewise the prophets, anointing them at a divine nod, made into certain figurative Christs; since they too bore in themselves the types of the kingly and ruling authority of the one and only true Christ, the divine Logos who reigns over all.
And indeed we have received the tradition that some even of the prophets themselves became, through anointing, Christs in figure, so that all these have their reference to the true Christ, the divine and heavenly Logos, who alone is the High Priest of all, alone the King of all creation, and alone the Father's Chief Prophet among the prophets.
The proof of this is that not one of those anointed of old by the symbol—neither priests nor kings nor prophets—obtained so great a power of godlike virtue as our Saviour and Lord Jesus, the only and true Christ, has displayed.
None of them, indeed—though for very many generations they shone in dignity and honour among their own people—ever surnamed his subjects 「Christians」 from the figurative title of Christ applied to himself; nor was reverent honour rendered to any of them by their subjects; nor, after his death, was there such devotion that men were ready even to die for the one honoured; nor did so great a stirring arise among all the nations of the inhabited world concerning any one of those men of that time—since in them the power of the symbol was not able to work so much as the manifestation of the truth shown forth through our Saviour did.
He, having received from no one symbols and types of the high priesthood, nor tracing his bodily descent from a priestly line, nor advanced to kingship by armed retainers, nor yet having become a prophet after the manner of the men of old, nor having obtained any rank or precedence at all among the Jews—was nevertheless adorned by the Father with all these things: if not in the symbols, yet in the truth itself.
And so, not having obtained things like those whom we have mentioned before, he is yet more than all of them proclaimed Christ; and as the only and true Christ of God himself, he filled the whole world with Christians, with his truly august and holy appellation, handing on to his followers no longer types or images, but the bare virtues themselves and a heavenly life, together with the very doctrines of truth.
And the anointing he received was not that prepared from bodily substances, but the very anointing befitting God, by the divine Spirit, through participation in the unbegotten and fatherly Godhead. This too Isaiah teaches, crying out somewhat thus as from Christ himself: 「The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because of which he anointed me; he sent me to preach good tidings to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind.」
And not Isaiah only, but David also cries aloud, addressing his person: 「Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever; a sceptre of uprightness is the sceptre of thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows.」 In which the text in the first line styles him God, and in the second honours him with a royal sceptre.
Then, descending in due order after the divine and royal power, he presents him as having become, in the third rank, Christ—anointed not with oil drawn from bodily matter, but with the divine oil of gladness; whereby he intimates also his exceptional, far better and different anointing, as compared with those anointed of old in a more bodily manner through the figures.
And elsewhere the same writer declares concerning him somewhat thus: 「The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies the footstool of thy feet」; and 「Out of the womb, before the morning star, I begat thee. The Lord sware, and will not repent: Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.」
Now this Melchizedek is introduced in the sacred writings as priest of God Most High, not designated by any prepared anointing, nor even belonging by succession of family to the priesthood among the Hebrews. For this reason our Saviour has been proclaimed Christ and priest with the taking of an oath, after his order, and not after the order of the others, who received symbols and types.
Whence too the history does not record that he was anointed bodily among the Jews, nor that he came of the priestly tribe; but that he was given substance from God himself, before the morning star—that is, before the constitution of the world—and that he holds his priesthood, immortal and ageless, unto the boundless age.
Of the incorporeal and divine anointing that came upon him, it is a great and manifest proof that he alone of all men, from of old and still even now, is throughout the whole world surnamed Christ among all men, and is confessed and witnessed by all under that appellation; that he is remembered among Greeks and barbarians; and that to this day he is honoured by his followers throughout the inhabited world as a king, marvelled at as more than a prophet, and glorified as the true and only High Priest of God, and above all these things as the Logos of God, pre-existent and given substance before all the ages, having received august honour from the Father, and worshipped as God.
But the most marvellous thing of all is this: that we who are consecrated to him honour him not with the mere sounds of voices and words, but with the whole disposition of the soul, so that we set even our witness to him above our very life.